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Zhe B*ioms of 
IReliQion 

A New Interpretation of the Baptist Faith 

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President of 
Southern Baptist Theological Seminary 

Author of 
"Why is Christianity True?'* 



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Philadelphia 

Hmerican Baptist publication Society 

Boston Chicago Atlanta 

New York St. Louis Dallas 



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LIBRARY of COM 
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APR 28 1908 

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Copyright 1908 by the 
American Baptist Publication Society 



Published February, 1908 



Jfrom tbe Society's own l>re«s 



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SYMPATHETIC AND DISCRIMINATING CRITIC 

PATIENT HELPER AND INSPIRING COMPANION 

IN ALL MY WORK 

THIS VOLUME IS LOVINGLY INSCRIBED 



PREFACE 

The motives which led to the preparation of this 
volume are set forth in the first chapter. For a 
number of years the author has felt that a fresh 
statement of the Baptist position was possible which 
would enable the world to understand us better. A 
series of addresses, including one before the Ameri- 
can Baptist Publication Society in St. Louis, Mo., in 
1905, another the same year at The Baptist World 
Congress in London, England, two addresses in 
Richmond, Va., in 1906, before Richmond College 
and The Baptist General Association, and another 
at the Baptist Convention of North America, at 
Jamestown, in 1907, set forth in one form or another 
the principles which are elaborated in the following 
pages. Upon the occasion of each of the above 
addresses the writer was urged by many to ex- 
pand the views expressed into a book. This he has 
here attempted to do, and submits the result to the 
judgment of his brethren. 

The aim has been constructive and irenic in the 
highest sense. Of course the author has frankly 
taken issue with those of other faiths in the exposi- 
tion of his own views where occasion required. But 
the chief object in view has been to expound New 

7 



8 PREFACE 

Testament Christianity in some of the more funda- 
mental and important aspects. God has given to the 
Baptists of the world a great and sublime task in 
the promulgation of principles on the preservation 
of which the spiritual and political hopes of the 
world depend. In America the Baptists have had a 
marvelous growth in influence, in numbers, in 
wealth, and all other forms of power. We are, in 
spite of our vast territory, our great numbers, and 
our emphasis upon individualism, a remarkably 
homogeneous people. The author hopes that in the 
pages which follow will be found some contribution 
toward the higher thinking, the deepening spirit- 
uality, and the increasing unity and practical effi- 
ciency of our people. 

It should be remarked that the sixteenth chapter 
is almost an exact reproduction of the address at 
Jamestown in May, 1907, on the " Contribution of 
Baptists to American Civilization." Chapters three 
and four are, in part, the address delivered for the 
Baptist Historical Society of Virginia in November, 
1906, at Richmond College. There are some slight 
differences of style as between these chapters and 
the remainder of the book which are to be accounted 
for by the fact that they were first given as 
addresses. 

E. Y. M. 
Louisville, Ky. 



CONTENTS 

Chapter Pagb 

I./ The New Test of Denominationalism . . n 

II. Denominationalism in Terms of the King- 

dom of God 27 

III. The Historical Significance of the Bap- 

tists 44 

IV. The Soul's Competency in Religion ... 59 

V. The Axioms of Religion 70 

VI. The Theological Axiom 79 

VII. The Religious Axiom 92 

VIII. The Ecclesiastical Axiom 127 

IX. The Moral Axiom 150 

X. Christian Nurture 168 

XI. The Religio-civic Axiom 185 

XII. The Social Axiom 201 

XIII. Baptists and General Organization . . .212 

XIV. Baptists and Christian Union 221 

XV. Institutional and Anti-institutional Chris- 

tianity 235 

XVI. The Contribution of the Baptists to 

American Civilization 255 

XVII. Baptists and World Progress 277 



The Axioms of Religion 



CHAPTER I 

THE NEW TEST OF DENOMINATIONALISM 

Each recurring season brings a new test to the 
trees of a forest. This oak perished because the 
foes which attacked it were too great for its 
powers of resistance. That pine was laid low because 
a fierce wind struck it at a new angle and thus 
discovered the one weak spot in its hold upon the 
earth. Under pressure of wind and snow that an- 
cient elm was split in two. The next season some 
neighbors of these go down for kindred reasons, 
while others remain standing throughout many 
generations. 

The centuries are to institutions what adverse con- 
ditions are to the forest trees. Changing circum- 
stances bring fresh tests of endurance. The weak or 
decrepit succumb, the strong survive. Some are so 
modified by environment that they lose their original 
characteristics entirely. Others are purged of dross 
and purified and unfold more fully their distinctive 

ii 



12 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



life and power. Still others coalesce with kindred 
institutions and together under a new combination 
life and progress are achieved. 

Since the Reformation denominationalism has 
been the characteristic expression of Christianity 
on its ecclesiastical side. The right of private 
judgment and freedom from ecclesiastical superiors, 
that priceless boon of modern believers, has led to 
great variety in the interpretation of the New Testa- 
ment. The touchstone hitherto has been conformity 
to the teachings of the Scriptures. This battle has 
been waged long and it may be truly said that at 
length it is virtually at an end. At least this is 
true in the realm of scholarship and among thinkers 
generally, although on the popular side it progresses 
still. So far as explicit New Testament teaching is 
concerned there are no important points left un- 
settled among scholars as to the organization and 
polity of the church. Men do not hesitate, however, 
to reject New Testament teaching on these points 
in the interest of a theory of development or for 
other reasons when it suits their purposes, and they 
seek to justify the procedure in many ways. 

New Test of Denominationalism. 

Practical conditions among us are to-day impos- 
ing a new test upon denominationalism. This test 
when fully applied will not, in the opinion of the 
writer, involve a rejection of New Testament teach- 
ings. It will rather supplement those teachings 



THE NEW TEST OF DENOMINATIONALISM 13 



and corroborate them in a new way. The prog- 
ress of events and the conditions of Christian 
work are the best interpreters of Scripture. Chris- 
tianity is like a knife of many blades and other de- 
vices to be used in turn as need arises. There is 
this difference however. In Christianity many of 
the blades are concealed from view until new emer- 
gencies bring to light their presence and use. Every 
interpretation of Scripture assumes, or should as- 
sume, the divinely adapted fitness of Scripture to 

j human need. History reacts upon and explains 
exegesis in many ways, just as the growth of a 
tree reveals what was lying potent in the seed, and 
as the progress of a building sheds light on the pre- 

1 liminary plans of the architect. Thus we are slowly 

1 obtaining an exposition of our exegesis. We are 
unfolding it into its implications and enlarging it 
into its logical and necessary outcome. 

The nature of the practical test which we refer 
to may be understood by a brief glance at some of 

; the problems and perils which confront all Chris- 
tian bodies to-day. These are for the most part 

j problems of adjustment of one kind or other. 

1 

; Problems of Adjustment. 

One of the most important of these is the problem 
of doctrinal adjustment. In all denominations there 
is a pronounced movement of thought on doctrinal 
teaching. It has assumed acute forms in most of 
the evangelical bodies in heresy trials in recent 



14 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



years. The lines of doctrinal cleavage are as radi- 
cal as at any time in the past, but the issues are new. 
As usual the extreme parties are doing most of 
the harm. On one side is the ultra-conservative, 
the man of the hammer and anvil method, who 
relies chiefly upon denunciation of opponents, and 
who cannot tolerate discussion on a fraternal basis ; 
on the other is the ultra-progressive whose lofty 
contempt of the " traditionalist " shuts him out from 
the ranks of sane scholarship and wise leadership. 
The really safe leaders of thought, however, are 
between these extremes. They are men who have 
sympathy on the one hand with those who are per- 
plexed by the difficulties to faith occasioned by 
modern science and philosophy, and on the other are 
resolved to be loyal to Christ and his gospel. Out 
of this situation arise two urgent questions. The 
first is this: What is the regulative principle of 
doctrinal growth and progress? The second is: 
What are the limits of doctrinal divergence within 
the pale of the denominational life? 

As to the first of these two questions few will 
venture to assert that doctrinal statements are per- 
manently stereotyped in any particular creed or 
book of theology which has appeared in the course 
of the Christian centuries; that the plates are, so 
to speak, in their final form, to be stowed away for 
safe keeping in the ecclesiastical vault and to be 
used for new editions when the old are exhausted. 
Such a claim would be tantamount to a claim that 



THE NEW TEST OF DENOMINATIONALISM 1 5 

said plates are inspired and that God has withdrawn 
his Holy Spirit from modern investigators in so 
far as their labors are designed to enlarge or deepen 
or modify past interpretations of Scripture, or to 
discover new side-lights upon Scripture from any 
department of science. Respecting the second ques- 
tion, as to the limits of doctrinal difference, there 
is much divergence of view among the denomina- 
tions themselves, and often within the pale of the 
particular denomination. It would be a great stride 
forward if our thinking on these two matters could 
be clarified. 

Another question of adjustment presses, and that 
is of the denominations to each other. What shall be 
our attitude on the great question of Christian union ? 
Are the denominations free to ignore this issue 
and in so doing can they remain loyal to the Master 
who prayed that his people might all be one ? It has 
become clear that artificially devised union among 
the various bodies can never be permanently effected. 
Recent examples also warn us against premature 
attempts at union even among closely related bodies. 
And yet there remains before us the reproach of a 
divided Christendom and in many instances an 
apparent waste of resources in fields where churches 
are multiplied beyond the needs of the communities. 
So long, however, as the consciences of Christians 
revolt at compromise or surrender of what they 
regard as the will of Christ for them, we cannot 
hope for a radical cure of these evils. It behooves 



1 6 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

us, therefore, to recognize that permanent Chris- 
tian union is to be realized only by training the con- 
science by means of the truth, and to ask what are 
the fundamental lines along which this training 
should proceed. 

Christianity and Social Service. 

There is also the matter of the adjustment of our 
Christianity to social service. There are many who 
feel strongly that at this point has the church of 
modern times most deeply sinned. They think the 
church has been too much like a star blazing above 
men to show the way to the next life. They think 
it should seek to become a lantern in whose light 
men may walk in the dark. Accusations are fre- 
quent that church and ministry are indifferent to 
social conditions. Smug, prosperous, and contented 
church-members, and genial ease-loving pastors, 
so we are told, live their lives and maintain their 
worship in oblivion of the tragedy and struggle of 
the masses, and careless of the cruelty and oppres- 
sion of wealth. The charge is of course far from 
being the whole truth. It is in part a case of mis- 
understanding, due to a difference of view as to the 
relative values and of method. 

To the best elements in the churches the material 
is not valued so highly as the moral and spiritual. 
Hence with them inequalities in economic conditions 
do not press so painfully upon consciousness as 
among those to whom the material is of primary 



THE NEW TEST OF DENOMINATIONALISM I? 

importance. Those who are without the moral 
discipline to endure hard conditions with cheer- 
fulness, or who see all things in the perspective of 
this life alone are at a serious disadvantage here." 
The misunderstanding is due in part also to a dif- 
ference in view as to the method of ameliorating 
human conditions. The church has said, make the 
tree good and the fruit will be good. Give men 
spiritual natures and you will thus regulate society 
best; whereas the critics have insisted that she 
I forsake evangelism for the other department of 
service. When all is said, however, it must be 
owned that a Christianity which is indifferent or 
callous to moral conditions of any kind is abnormal 
1 and imperfect, and it must also be owned that 
! evangelism does not exhaust the programme of the 
churches of Jesus Christ. We need, therefore, a 
clearer grasp of the nature and limits of the social 
duties of the church. We need a view on this point 
which can be intelligently advocated, propagated, 
and defended, and at the same time adjusted to 
other departments of duty and service. Is the 
church of Christ in relation to social questions a 
square peg in a round hole? Is it a misfit in social 
effort or is it unfit ? If not, how can it be made to 
fit? 

On the Foreign Mission Field. 

On the foreign mission fields a new situation has 
arisen in connection with the increasing growth and 

B 



l8 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

triumph of our missionary labors. What form of 
Christianity is best adapted to the civilizations of 
the East ? Is it wise to attempt to urge our Western 
forms of ecclesiastical organization upon the Orient? 
Should there be a fusion of the various Christian 
elements in India, China, and Japan, into as many 
national or racial organizations, which shall omit 
the distinctive features of the West? These are 
vital questions to-day in all these countries and will 
engage attention in increasing measure in the near 
future. 

There is another matter of far-reaching signifi- 
cance. How are the various denominations to pre- 
serve a loyalty so intense as to make them compact 
and united in aim, and so inspired by a common 
spirit as to render them useful ? When the modern 
denominations were in process of formation con- 
troversy was the bellows which kept hot the fires 
of zeal. Competition in missionary effort has 
played a similar part in more recent years. No 
one can question that controversy is a duty when 
circumstances demand it and truth is in peril. It 
will never, under earthly conditions, cease to be 
necessary within certain limits. But it is quite gen- 
erally agreed in our day that propagandism 
through interdenominational controversy has in 
large measure served its day. The spirit of the age 
frowns upon such controversy, and the man who has 
no gift for other forms of service finds himself in 
a constantly narrowing field of usefulness. And 



THE NEW TEST OF DENOMINATIONALISM 19 

yet as we face the situation created by a long-delayed 
Christian union, and at the same time by a tendency 
to denominational dissolution we are in danger of 
resolving our Christianity back into a mass of un- 
related and non-cohesive atoms. There is indeed 
a marked movement toward an anti-institutional, 
anti-ecclesiastical, and wholly individualistic Chris- 
tianity. The period of the judges in Israel, of the 
little city democracies in the period of their anarchy 
and decline in Greece, and of the breaking up of 
Europe into feudalism in the Middle Ages, are 
historic analogues which suggest the possible out- 
come of such a movement. The man who is un- 
attached to any religious organization, or equally 
attached to all, may of course exert some local in- 
fluence for good combined with a very bad exam- 
ple of a false individualism. But he will lose all 
that splendid opportunity for service which comes of 
a life reenforced by thousands of others united and 
organized and aggressive in the pursuit of common 
ends. If the mass of individual Christians is to 
become simply a vortex ring of dancing atoms, 
each moving aimlessly around its own center, Chris- 
tianity will soon spend itself. 

A New Cohesive Principle Needed. 

There must be, then, some motive or incentive 
or cohesive principle strong enough to give unity to 
each of the religious bodies if these bodies are to 
continue their careers of usefulness. Denomina- 



20 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

tional self-respect, a sense of a divine calling and 
mission, must possess any religious body which 
counts for much in the world. The prophetic mood, 
which implies that the soul is conquered by some 
great truth or truths, and seeks passionately and 
restlessly to propagate those truths, is a prime con- 
dition of power. 

Now if the vigor and intensity of this pro- 
phetic burden can no longer be produced, as 
in the formative period of denominationalism, 
by the sense of discovery in the realm of truth and 
experience and by competition and conflict, we 
must somehow find another incentive. Some moral 
equivalent must be found which will serve to im- 
pel us forward with something like the pristine 
energy and persistence. The most intense denomi- 
nationalists are often animated by this feeling in 
their assertive insularity and their feeling of re- 
pugnance toward suggestions of Christian union. 
They are afraid of lukewarmness and lack of force. 
It is certainly true that negative moods do not win in 
religion. None of the higher forms of spiritual re- 
ligion have ever made wide progress merely as a 
leaven. Aggressive advocacy by deeply earnest indi- 
viduals is the sole condition. The hardest metals can 
be melted if you get a fire hot enough. All church 
problems are at bottom problems of spiritual tem- 
perature. God's Spirit supplies the flame. Earthly 
conditions furnish the fuel. Well-directed effort 
raises the temperature to the desired point. 



the new test of denominationalism 21 

Pressure Felt by All Religious Bodies. 

All the evangelical churches have felt the pres- 
sure of the problems and difficulties outlined above. 
Among Methodists, Presbyterians, and Episcopa- 
lians, there have been heresy trials which have at- 
tracted national if not world-wide attention in 
recent years, and all alike feel the urgency of the 
missionary, social, and other aspects of the problems. 
Baptists have also felt these conditions and experi- 
enced similar embarrassment at certain points. With 
the Baptists all the perplexities are dealt with in a 
more direct and simple way than is the case with 
the other more complex and highly organized 
bodies. But among Baptists there are conditions 
peculiar to themselves which call for attention. 
For one thing Baptists have increased in numbers 
and in wealth so rapidly that these two elements 
alone have created many problems. How shall these 
vast numbers be made thoroughly homogeneous in 
spirit and aim? How may they be enlisted in the 
aggressive enterprises of a militant and conquering 
missionary gospel? How shall our vast wealth be 
drawn into the service of the kingdom of God? 

Then too, out of our doctrine of independence, how 
shall we realize, in any adequate manner, the com- 
plementary principle of interdependence? Baptists 
must face this problem with renewed interest in 
order to avoid serious waste and great loss of 
power. We must work out patiently our problem 



22 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



of democracy and unity. Experiment has been 
demonstrating lately the startling energy of a wave 
of the sea. The power of the impact of the wave 
depends upon two factors apart from the impelling 
wind. One is the elevation of its center of gravity 
above the common level of the sea, the other is the 
rotary motion of the separate drops of water which 
enter into the formation of the wave. Baptist unity 
is like that, not of a block of granite, but of a wave 
of the sea. Individual energy answers to the ro- 
tation of the drops. The elevation of the common 
life of the churches fixes the spiritual center of 
gravity. The breath of the Spirit of God is the im- 
pelling wind. Our energy will prove resistless 
when all the conditions are fulfilled. 

An Anti-institutional Christianity. 

There is one extreme, although as yet quite small, 
group among us who are anti-institutional, or at 
least anti-ceremonial in their conception of Chris- 
tianity. They are ready to sacrifice the ordinances 
and church order to the last possible limit in the 
interest of expediency. They want the spirit of re- 
ligion without.a body; or at least they want only an 
astral body which is unaffected by ordinances or 
forms. A few others would centralize our Baptist 
polity and adopt an approach to a Presbyterian or 
Episcopal church order. These parties are not large 
and there is little prospect of a triumph of their 
views in America at least. They are mentioned 



THE NEW TEST OF DENOMINATIONALISM 2$ 

merely to indicate as completely as may be the 
currents and eddies of our denominational life. 

It is unnecessary to enlarge further this outline 
of the present general situation of the various re- 
ligious bodies. Enough has been said to indicate the 
gravity of the problems which press for solution, 
and the urgency and vastness of our immediate task 
as Christians. 

Among those who recognize the authority of 
the New Testament there are two prevalent general 
views as to church order. One insists that the New 
Testament gives final form to ecclesiastical organiza- 
tion; the other contends for a principle of develop- 
ment from New Testament beginnings. The con- 
gregational bodies represent the first view and the 
episcopal churches the development principle. Car- 
dinal Newman has given the most consistent ex- 
pression to the development idea in his well-known 
discussion of the subject. His principles of develop- 
ment are exactly adapted to relieve the conscience of 
the man who has left the Church of England for 
the Roman Catholic fold. They are an elaborate 
theoretical vindication of Romanism. One of their 
defects is that they do not conform to the facts of 
history but to an ideal. Another serious and vital 
fault is that they fail to show that in the Romish 
development the New Testament type is preserved. 
Newman's introspection led him into the subjective 
snare. By his speculations to relieve his inward 
distress he opened a trap-door in his own floor 



2 4 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



through which he fell into the subcellar of an out- 
grown system. 

Two Issues. 

The real issues between the two theories, the con- 
gregational on the one hand and the episcopal and 
presbyterial on the other, are two. First, which 
best preserves the New Testament principles and 
ideals; second, which is best fitted to accomplish 
the enlarging task of Christianity in the world. On 
the side of the Scriptures the test is one of con- 
formity. On the practical side the test is one of 
adaptation to changing and enlarging tasks. We 
inherit from the Reformation and the New Testa- 
ment the first test. The second has been imposed 
upon us by the progress of events. The two tests 
are harmonious. Indeed they are mutually regula- 
tive of each other. It is a flagrant violation of the 
New Testament for a religious body to ignore con- 
ditions and the state of human need. In meeting 
these needs in any serious way we will be driven 
inevitably to the New Testament principles. 

The practical test is the one which presses at pres- 
ent. It has a profound bearing upon the whole move- 
ment of an ever-advancing civilization, as well as 
upon the deepest religious yearnings and aspirations 
of the human spirit. The issue is taking shape in 
modern thinking in many forms. It may be stated 
in various ways. Will the widening tasks and in- 
creasing burdens of the churches result in the 



THE NEW TEST OF DENOMINATIONALISM 2$ 

extension of the principle of episcopacy, or will the 
ever-growing principle of democracy gradually un- 
dermine and dissolve episcopacy? Is the genius of 
Christianity best expressed in systems of corporate 
authority or in those of corporate freedom? Is 
the church a body of spiritual equals or shall it 
consist of a group of inferiors presided over by an 
authoritative group of superiors? Does it conduce 
to the progress of Christianity to entrust its great 
interests to the laity as well as clergy, or should 
the power of the laity be held within fixed limits by 
their clerical superiors ? 

Fresh Statements Needed. 

Now it is the conviction of the present writer 
that the time has come for the various Christian 
bodies to give a fresh account of themselves to the 
world, and in an entirely new way. The questions 
should be not one of past service merely, but of 
fitness for present service. The question of con- 
formity to Scripture properly understood always 
involves the total question of conformity to racial 
needs and advancing civilization. Is there flexi- 
bility and elasticity or is there rigidity and petrjifac- 
tion? Is Christianity conceived as a rule or as a 
principle? Are the tests those of life or those of 
the square and compass? Do the church polities 
contain in themselves heterogeneous and alien ele- 
ments or are they in harmony with the genius and 
spirit as well as the express teachings of the New 



2 6 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



Testament? What contributions have the various 
polities to make to the subjects discussed in the pre- 
ceding pages, such as missions, social service, Chris- 
tian union, evangelism, civic righteousness, and 
family life, and others ? 

The aim of this book is to make this statement 
from the point of view of the Baptists. What is 
the distinctive message of the Baptists to the world ? 
How far does our simple congregational polity em- 
body the essential things in New Testament Chris- 
tianity and to what extent is it adapted to the 
present and future progress of the gospel on earth ? 
The question here is not primarily concerning bap- 
tism or the Lord's Supper or even church polity as 
these have been discussed in the past. The attempt 
is rather to state our case in the light of primary 
and universal principles, and to show the relation 
of the ordinances and polity to these principles. 
These principles of course are taken from the New 
Testament. The authority of the Scriptures lies 
at the basis of our plea. We do not believe any form 
of Christianity which breaks with the Scripture as 
the revealed and authoritative word of God can long 
serve the interests of God's kingdom on earth in 
any thoroughgoing way. Every position, therefore, 
which we assume in the following pages is either 
directly or indirectly grounded upon the revelation 
of God in Christ as recorded in the Old and New 
Testament Scriptures. 



CHAPTER II 

DENOMINATIONALISM IN TERMS OF THE KINGDOM 
OF GOD 

A painted rainbow never equals a real one. An 
artificial diamond lacks the brilliancy of one made in 
nature's workshop. The human touch always leaves 
its mark of inferiority when brought into compari- 
son with God's handiwork. This is true in religion 
as well as in nature. We must constantly return 
to the divine standard in dealing with religious 
organizations. 

Church Polity and Spiritual Law. 

It is proposed in this chapter to examine denomi- 
nationalism in the light of the New Testament ideal 
of the kingdom of God; or, what amounts to the 
same thing, to consider ecclesiastical polity as over 
against universal spiritual laws. We are to seek 
first the distinctive ideals and principles of the 
religion of Christ, and then to ask whether or not 
church polity bears any relation to them, or whether, 
on the contrary, polity is solely a question of expe- 
diency. Or, recurring to the figure, letting the 
rainbow answer to the great New Testament ideal 
of the kingdom of God, do the religious bodies re- 
produce its seven colors and its curve? Or is there 

27 



28 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



any necessary relation between the form of church 
organization and the ideal of the kingdom ? Do the 
churches need the kingdom in determining their 
polities ? We approach our subject by analyzing the 
ideal of the kingdom into some of its constituent 
parts. 

The first point to be noted is that the kingdom of 
Ood brings to us a personal as distinguished from 
a positive religion. That is, it is not a set of legal 
enactments put down in a book, like those of Mo- 
hammed in the Koran, to be obeyed as external 
statutes. It is, on the contrary, a personal religion 
It teaches that a Person-God-took the initiative 
in salvation, and that a person-man-responds to it 
Primarily then, Christianity is a relation between 
persons— God and man. The method of all legal re- 
ligions is that of the command and the prohibition. 
They say Thou shall," and " Thou shall not," with 
the result that human nature revolts, or else tends to 
obey mechanically rather than through love. " When 
the commandment came sin revived and I died," says 
i'aul. Human nature is made much after the dis- 
position of the old woman in the walled city who 
had never desired to go outside the walls until her 
friends urged her to remain inside until death that 
it might be told of her. Thenceforth she was irre- 
sistibly impelled to go outside and at length did 
so. A religion which commands awakens revolt 
if there are only commands. Christianity as a per- 
sonal religion begins with faith. Its method of 



DENOMINATIONALISM IN TERMS OF KINGDOM 29 

growth is fellowship with God, entering into his 
plans, grasping his aims. 

The Emphasis on Personality and Love. 

A second point is that this religion of the kingdom 
and of personal relationships very naturally puts 
much emphasis upon the divine personality and love, 
or the Fatherhood of God. The idea of the kingdom 
teaches that the realm of salvation is an ordered 
sphere — that in it laws prevail. The idea of Father- 
hood shows that the realm of salvation is more 
than mere law ; that it is the sphere of the highest, 
deepest, and tenderest of known relationships — that 
between father and son. Those in the kingdom call 
God Father, and those who call God Father are 
swayed and molded by the laws which are of the 
essence of the kingdom. These two conceptions, 
therefore, are not contradictory but supplementary. 
Each is an exhaustive statement of the contents of 
Christ's religion in its own way and from its own 
point of view ; one from the point of view of consti- 
tuted order, the other from the point of view of 
personal relationships. 1 

The next note which distinguishes the kingdom 
is the principle of revelation. Revelation is the 
method and guarantee of intercourse between the 
persons who enter into the religious relationships, 
God and man. Revelation implies the kinship be- 
tween God and man, that God can communicate and 

1 Matt. 10 : 20; 6 : 5-15; 10 : 7, 8; John 3 : 3, 16. 



3° THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

man receive messages. Revelation implies human 
capacity for God. 1 

The fourth distinctive thing in this religion of 
the kingdom is that Christ himself is the medium 
of revelation and redemption. He brings God near 
God comes to us in and through Christ; we ap- 
proach God in and through him. He is the revela- 
tion of God to us. The soul cannot thrive on ab- 
stract notions about God, just as a bird cannot fly 
in a vacuum, or a tree root itself in a bank of mist 
or as a vine cannot climb a moonbeam. Christ made 
the idea of God concrete. Christ is God's message 
to man. It is at this point that the authoritative- 
ness and regulative value of the Scriptures come 
into view. The Scriptures alone enable us to main- 
tain contact with the Christ of history. His image 
grows dim, his authority over the soul inevitably 
wanes when detached from the historic records 
So far are the Scriptures from hindering the free 
intercourse of the soul with Christ, as some allege 
that we may assert on the contrary their indispensa- 
bleness to that free intercourse. These records are 
the sheet-anchor of Christian experience and of 
Christian theology. 

Now the above fundamental qualities and attri- 
butes of Christ's religion determine by necessity and 
beforehand its methods and the laws of its practical 
development in the world and the forms it will 
assume. 

1 Matt. ii : 25-27; 1 Cor. 2 : 6-16. 



denominationalism in terms of kingdom 3 1 

The Practical Unfolding of Ideals. 

Observe then the stages in the practical unfold- 
ing of these ideals. As personal it will be the 
intercourse of persons, one person speaking to 
another. As an ordered kingdom it will require 
exposition of its laws. As fatherhood and sonship 
it will involve an attitude of filial obedience on the 
part of man. As revelation it will require intelli- 
gence and a responsive moral nature. 

What then will be the initial stage in its develop- 
ment on earth ? It will take the form of a word of 
God — a gospel. The first gospel was the incarnate 
Word of God, and afterward the " good news " of 
salvation to which the incarnation gave rise. Ob- 
serve that it is the word which is the fivefold symbol 
of all the marks of the kingdom outlined above. 
The word is the symbol and means of intercourse 
between persons. It is the symbol for the constitu- 
tion of an ordered kingdom among intelligent be- 
ings. Laws cannot be enacted without words. 
Through words fatherhood reveals itself and by 
them develops and unfolds sonship. It is the only 
fitting symbol and means of a revelation of truth 
from above. It is taken by the Evangelist John as 
the descriptive name of Christ himself in his func- 
tion as revealer of God. " In the beginning was the 
Word." 

This prominence of a gospel, or a word of 
God, will emphasize the importance of prophecy 



32 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

and preaching, of evangelism and teaching, in the 
progress of the kingdom. For these all find the 
reason of their existence in the idea of the word. 
Thus the word becomes personalized in the human 
agent of redemption. This is the way of the king- 
dom. In Gilbert Parker's novel " The Right of 
Way," Charlie Steele the drunkard struggled in 
vain against his appetite until a human love and a 
human will came to his rescue reenforcing his own 
feeble will. In ' Les Miserables " Victor Hugo ex- 
hibits a like insight into the divine method. The 
criminal who stole the candlesticks from the bishop 
was apprehended and made to face the owner, but 
was released upon the assertion of the good bishop 
that the candlesticks were the rightful property of 
the thief. You no longer belong to yourself, was 
the bishop's declaration, but to God. Afterward the 
thief passed through a tragic struggle, alone with 
God, which led to his spiritual regeneration. But in 
that struggle the bishop's forgiving face was omni- 
present in the guilty man's imagination and con- 
science, and had for him almost the value of God. 
Thus in the kingdom of God the human mediator 
does not come through sacraments and exclusive 
religious privileges between the soul and its God, 
but enters by the truth and love into the life to 
redeem it. Thus man again incarnates the word, 
and becomes a sort of burning bush of divine mani- 
festation to save, and not a priestly and exclusive 
manipulator of sacraments. 



denominationalism in terms of kingdom 33 

Man's Response to the Word. 

What, then, will be the answer on man's part to 
this proclamation and incarnation of the word ? The 
answer is faith. Not faith in the sense of blind 
acceptance of hidden mysteries; not implicit faith 
in the sense of acceptance of the total body of teach- 
ings of an infallible church, but faith in the biblical 
sense of an intelligent response to the revelation of 
truth from person to person. This faith arouses 
the entire being, the intellect, the emotions, the will, 
and the moral nature. The intellect grasps truth, 
the emotions are drawn out by trust and affection, 
the will yields to the commanding will of another, 
and the moral nature by an intuition of right and 
wrong puts the stamp of its approval upon the soul's 
act. Christ is the object of the soul's trust, and he 
thus inducts it into the kingdom, and reveals to it 
God's fatherhood. 

Observe now that the first and immediate result 
or attendant circumstance of the act of faith is re- 
generation and redemption. The immanent Spirit 
of God employs the word of truth as instrument, 
and the soul, fully aroused in all its parts, is brought 
forth into a new life — is constituted spiritually a son 
of God, and translated into the ordered spiritual 
realm of God's kingdom. 1 

As this spiritual life begins in a believer so it 
continues. " As ye received Christ Jesus the Lord 

1 Mark 1 : 15; John 3 : 3; Rom. 5 : 1. 
C 



34 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



so walk in him," is Paul's injunction. Faith is not 
only the initial act of the soul in response to the 
word; it is also generic and representative of the 
soul's permanent attitude. All the after-life of the 
believer is a projection or continuation of the first 
act of faith. The open mind and cognition of truth, 
the obedient will trusting Christ, the moral intuition 
of the excellence of the Christian way— that is, 
all those elements of the first act of faith are implicit 
in all the believer's relations to God in the life which 
follows. Thus by repetition of the initial act- of 
faith we work out our salvation. It is like making a 
dotted line on a piece of paper with a pencil. First 
the dots are wide apart. Then we fill in the blank 
spaces by greater fidelity to duty, and at length we 
make the line black and continuous. In other words, 
faith is no longer an interrupted and occasional but 
the permanent attitude of the soul. 

Growth in grace is a progressive apprehension of 
the grace which came when the soul was regener- 
ated. Salvation and sanctification move forward in 
parallel lines with faith until both are consummated 
in the salvation to be revealed at the last time. Faith 
then at the beginning, in the midst, and at the end of 
the Christian life is the characteristic Christian atti- 
tude. It is the response of the entire spiritual nature 
of man aroused in all its parts to the approach of God 
the Father, through the revealing Christ, constitu- 
ting men members of his kingdom through his word. 
The above set of forces and ideals operating in the 



DENOMINATIONALISM IN TERMS OF KINGDOM 35 

manner indicated is the kingdom of God on earth. 
This is the kingdom everywhere proclaimed by 
Christ. 

Spiritual Affinity Leads to Church 
Organization. 

Now the individuals who thus respond to God 
by faith and who are regenerated by his grace are 
inevitably drawn together by spiritual affinity into 
fellowship with each other through Christ, the re- 
vealer of God the Father. And in this way the 
church arises. It comes into being in a sense just 
as a diamond mine comes into existence. Diamonds 
are usually found, not scattered broadcast over con- 
tinents, but collected at certain points. This is be- 
cause the heat and pressure necessary to produce 
them were felt at these particular points. Each dia- 
mond was born, so to speak, of an experience com- 
mon to all the rest. What shape it bore in its pre- 
vious state of existence matters nothing. By some 
wondrous act of change nature transformed it. Thus 
by a common experience of God's regenerating grace 
the church arises. 1 It is the social expression of 
the spiritual experiences common to a number of 
individuals. The basis of their associations together 
is the common sense of need due to sin — a common 
experience of forgiveness and regeneration through 
the common exercise of faith. The same divine heat 
and pressure acted upon them all. Identity of need, 

*Acts 2 : 47. 



36 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



identity of grace to meet it, identity of privilege in 
their direct fellowship with God, and identity of 
obligation to make known to others the good news of 
God's grace— these constitute the inner side of the 
church's justification of her existence. Christ's 
command and action in bringing the church into 
existence is the external authority which constitutes 
the ultimate ground of its life and being. 

The relations of the church to the kingdom are 
now apparent. The kingdom precedes the church 
in the order of time. But the laws and ideals of the 
kingdom give form to the church. The kingdom 
and the visible church are not identical. But the 
kingdom imposes upon the church its constitution 
and prescribes its laws and determines the nature of 
its ordinances and organization. It has been said 
that the contour of every leaf bears a certain re- 
semblance to the contour of the tree from which it 
is taken. This may or may not be true. It does 
contain a possible analogy for spiritual truth. The 
local church is like a leaf on the tree of the kingdom 
of God. As such it must reproduce in its own 
measure the outlines of the kingdom. The motion 
and the forces which produced the solar system 
operated in a uniform manner. The heavenly bodies 
all became spheres. The planets are smaller than 
the sun, but like the sun, their source and center, 
they are spheres. The church may be described as 
the institutional embodiment of the principles and 
ideals of the kingdom for practical purposes. The 



DENOMINATIONALISM IN TERMS OF KINGDOM 37 

church is a divine contrivance for realizing the ends 
of the kingdom of God. It becomes evident thus 
that we may not estimate the church apart from the 
kingdom. We can only find the criteria for judging 
the church by carefully analyzing the essential prin- 
ciples revealed in Scripture as constitutive of the 
kingdom of God. 

A False Assumption. 

It is often assumed in discussions of the church 
that these relations to the kingdom are non-existent, 
as if church organization and polity were purely 
matters of expediency or of historical development. 
On the contrary, as the church is the institutional 
embodiment of the principles of the kingdom of God, 
and the only adequate embodiment, it is altogether 
possible that a question of polity may under certain 
conditions involve the very life of Christianity itself. 
If any one doubts the vital bearing of the institu- 
tional side of Christianity upon human welfare and 
ordered progress let him turn his eyes to those 
countries where Roman Catholicism has sway, and 
let him observe the stagnation and blight which have 
fallen upon those peoples. There are ecclesiastical 
polities which quench the spirit of Christianity. A 
living faith is at once suffocated when it seeks free- 
dom for expansion under them. It will always be 
found, moreover, that this repressive tendency of 
the polity is in direct ratio to its divergence from the 
principles and ideals of the kingdom of God. 



38 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



Spiritual Laws of the Kingdom. 

Keeping in mind, now, the foregoing outline of 
the fundamental principles of the kingdom of God 
and its relations to the church, we may gather up the 
New Testament teachings as to the kingdom in the 
form of a series of spiritual laws which must be 
respected in any and every ecclesiastical polity which 
can in any sense lay claim to biblical warrant. These 
laws, it will be observed, are inherent in the very es- 
sence and idea of the kingdom. They constitute 
the colors and reveal the curve of the rainbow of the 
divine kingdom. 

The first is the law of Salvation : Faith in Christ 
the Son of God. This excludes meritorious works, 
the acceptance of a formal creed, or entrance merely 
into a visible church organization, or grace through 
humanly administered sacraments, as conditions of 
salvation. Any one of these substitutes for faith 
would destroy the religion as personal and bring it 
into the class of positive religions. Moreover either 
would dim if not destroy the sense of sonship and of 
Fatherhood, which would empty Christianity of its 
essential contents. The church which obscures this 
law is out of harmony with the kingdom. 

The second is the law of Worship: Freedom of 
intercourse between the Father in heaven and the 
child. This excludes of course the limiting of ac- 
ceptable worship to particular places, or through 
human mediators, or by means of physical appli- 



DENOMINATIONALISM IN TERMS OF KINGDOM 39 



ances. One of the most striking things in the teach- 
ings of Jesus was the absence of dependence upon 
such things. His religion is the foe to the idea of 
the holy place, the holy person, and the holy thing, 
in any such sense as would give these peculiar 
sacredness or as possessing an inherent sanctity or 
efficacy in communicating grace. " The hour Com- 
eth and now is when the true worshippers shall 
worship the Father in spirit and truth." 

The third is the law of Filial Service. This is of 
course the idea which answers to that of the Father- 
hood of God. The church is the filial society. Its 
form of government, its ordinances, its rules and 
regulations, must be molded on this principle. 
Whenever a church interposes between the child 
and the Father, through sacrament, through human 
priesthood or hierarchy, through centralized gov- 
ernment, through authoritative oligarchies of any 
kind in spiritual affairs, it ceases to conform to the 
kingdom of God, and becomes a juvenile court or 
orphanage instead. Christ founded an institution 
to bear the name of church with no such marks. 

The fourth is the law of Liberty. As the kingdom 
comes always in the first instance to the individual 
and can only so come; as fatherhood and sonship 
are relations expressive of individual and not of 
corporate experiences ; and as there is in every re- 
generated life an element of privacy ; as personality 
indeed is in every case an inner circle where outside 
feet may not enter, so the life of the kingdom must 



4° THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



forever be a life of free service " under the eye and 
in the strength of God." This autonomy of the 
believer's life is inherent in the very idea of grace, 
which means that God comes into the soul to raise 
it into a state of moral power, and transform it into 
his own image. To deny the liberty and autonomy 
of the soul under God is to impugn grace itself. 

The fifth is the law of Interdependence and Broth- 
erhood. The free soul is not an isolated soul. Other 
free souls enter in manifold ways into its life. But 
these all are regulated and ruled by the same grace 
of God the Father in Christ by which these asso- 
ciated souls may influence each other. The com- 
mon Lordship of Christ over all and the sufficiency 
of grace toward all are the two facts which forever 
exclude lordship of the one over the other. Their 
relations to each other are those of brothers, and 
not of masters and servants. Every ecclesiastical 
polity must recognize this fact. 1 

The sixth is the law of Edification. This re- 
quires that Christian growth and nurture be con- 
ducted on lines consonant with the essential princi- 
ples of the kingdom. As the word is the instrument 
of the Spirit in the regenerating act wherein faith 
is the human response to God, so also in the sancti- 
fying process. Truth apprehended and obeyed is 
the way of God's kingdom in making men holy. 
"Sanctify them through thy truth, thy word is 
truth," was the prayer of Jesus. To make of ordi- 

»i Cor. i 2 : I2 . 3I; 2 cor. n : 7 -ii; Eph. 4 : 16. 



DENOMINATIONALISM IN TERMS OF KINGDOM 41 

nances sacraments possessing spiritual efficacy in 
themselves is to change the nature of faith and to 
degrade the entire process of sanctification. The 
opus operatum of the Roman Catholic Church in- 
volves a theory of the ordinances which is sub- 
versive of the spirituality of the kingdom. Ordi- 
nances as symbols of truth assist faith and explicate 
the ideals of the kingdom. Ordinances as sacra- 
ments obscure both. Baptism and the Lord's Supper 
as symbols of truth with the explicit sanction of 
Christ for perpetual observance, taking their places 
in the kingdom of truth along with other things and 
operating upon intelligence and faith after the 
manner of the word, are one thing ; but transformed 
into channels of grace limiting and restricting God's 
love in any degree to the human mediators who ad- 
minister them, they are a reversion to a lower type 
of religion. The ordinances are vocal with truth, not 
magical with occult power. 

The seventh is the law of Holiness. This implies 
that all the means adopted in the church must be 
adjusted to the ends of personal and social right- 
eousness. Nothing is more terrible in Christ's 
teachings than his arraignment of merely ceremonial 
righteousness and empty orthodoxy. 

Church Order Not Subject to Ordinary Laws 
of Expediency. 

All these principles will receive further state- 
ment under other forms in later chapters. They are 



4 2 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



set forth as the ground work for what shall follow. 
The chief point at present is to show that ecclesiasti- 
cal organization and life are not to be conceived as 
subject merely to ordinary laws of expediency. Nor 
are they to be regarded solely as so many attempted 
interpretations of a particular set of proof texts 
in the New Testament. They are rather under the 
sway of a group of universal and fundamental 
principles which inhere in the very essence of the 
kingdom of God itself. J. H. Newman in his work 
"Development of Christian Doctrine " sought to 
show that the Roman Catholic is the only existing 
modern representative of the New Testament 
church. He seeks to establish this by his theory 
of ecclesiastical development from New Testa- 
ment Christianity with its seven tests, viz : " preser- 
vation of the idea," "continuity of principles, ,, 
^ power of assimilation/' "early anticipation}' 
"logical sequence," "preservative additions," and 
" chronic sequence." * 

I have no intention of discussing this theory 
at length but simply ask the reader's careful at- 
tention to the preceding exposition of the essential 
nature of the kingdom and the laws thereof as 
criteria for estimating the claims of any church. It 
will then be perfectly apparent that Newman's ap- 
plication of his own theory to the Roman Catholic 
Church breaks down at many points. Romanism 
certainly fails to preserve the New Testament 
1 Pp. 62-64. 



DENOMINATIONALISM IN TERMS OF KINGDOM 43 



" idea " in the law of Salvation and of Edification 
as well as in other respects. It can in no just 
meaning of the words be said to exhibit a " con- 
tinuity of principles " from the New Testament 
times. It is indeed at most points a system totally 
at variance with the New Testament ideals of 
religion. 

In closing this chapter we recur once more to our 
figure of the rainbow, by way of gathering up our 
conclusions. The kingdom of God is the rainbow 
of human hope formed by the sunlight of divine 
revelation in Jesus Christ. Its colors represent the 
primary elements of truth which that revelation 
brings. Church organizations have it in their 
power to reproduce or obscure those colors. Sacra- 
mentalism dims the great truth of God's direct 
dealing with the soul of man. Episcopacies and 
hierarchies obscure the truth that all souls are free 
and individually responsible to God. In succeeding 
chapters we shall seek to make these statements 
good and to elaborate many other aspects of our 
subject. 



CHAPTER III 

THE HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE BAPTISTS 

Baptists have a noble history. It is fitting to ask 
the question: What is their historical significance? 
What is their distinctive contribution to the re- 
ligious life and thought of mankind? In this chap- 
ter an answer is given to these questions somewhat 
different in form from that ordinarily heard. It is 
different, however, not in the sense that it is con- 
tradictory to answers previously given, but rather 
that it seeks to sum them up in a single principle. 

Baptists certainly have a consistent record. In 
their advocacy of soul freedom in its completest 
measure, and of the principle of the separation of 
Church and State, in their insistence upon believer's 
baptism and a regenerate church-membership, there 
is not a fleck or stain upon the fair page of their 
history. 

Baptists in Rhode Island and Virginia. 

As to the doctrine of soul liberty and separation 
of Church and State they have so far outstripped 
all other religious bodies in modern times that with- 
out doubt the impartial historian in the future as in 
the past will accord to them the palm of leadership. 
In their first Confessions of Faith in England in 
44 



HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE BAPTISTS 45 

the seventeenth century this principle was clearly 
and distinctly avowed. In Rhode Island under Roger 
Williams they planted the seed in American soil 
long before the other colonies were prepared for it. 
In Virginia there occurred about a hundred years 
after the founding of Rhode Island the most typical 
and interesting struggle for religious liberty which 
the world has ever seen. The interest of this Vir- 
ginia struggle warrants our dwelling upon it a mo- 
ment here. 

I have said it was typical. That is, the successive 
stages of the conflict appear. The ground was won 
inch by inch. Imprisonment and persecution in 
other forms had but one effect upon the zeal of the 
fathers; it fanned it into an intenser flame. In 
Rhode Island there are but two stages, the banish- 
ment of Roger Williams from Massachusetts, and 
at length the new charter and the beginning of the 
new era in the world's spiritual career. In Virginia 
on the contrary the darkness was driven back more 
gradually. There was the contest over the question 
of freedom of worship, over the general assessment, 
and the glebes. At length after many hardships 
and struggles Virginia Baptists conquered and the 
established church was overthrown. 

Virginia Baptists were alone in this struggle so 
far as other religious bodies were concerned. There 
were indeed great statesmen who championed their 
cause who were not Baptists. Madison and Jeffer- 
son and George Washington were enlightened men 



46 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



on this great theme as on others, men with new 
" spiritual empires " in their brains. But without the 
ceaseless agitation, the continuous stream of petitions 
and protests, which poured into the halls of legisla- 
tion from the Baptists, no statesman could have 
stemmed the tide in favor of perpetuating religious 
privilege through an established church. In those 
days our Methodist brethren were not yet free from 
alliance with the established church and hence could 
not enter the lists in the cause of complete separation 
of Church and State, and as a matter of fact were 
not found there. The Presbyterians at certain stages 
of the conflict rendered fine service and made some 
notable deliverances, but their record is an incon- 
sistent one. At times also they were on the side of 
legalized ecclesiastical privilege. The Episcopal 
Church, of course, held the reins of power and 
tightened its grip as danger of disestablishment 
loomed on the horizon. They were in those days 
particularly hostile to the Baptists. Happily we 
have fallen upon better times and there is a growth 
of the spirit of brotherhood and co-operation among 
the various religious bodies. But Baptists would be 
untrue to themselves and to the cause of truth if 
they failed to recount for the generations of the 
present and the future the brilliant achievements of 
their Rhode Island and Virginia fathers, achieve- 
ments which, as the world now admits, had enfolded 
within them the most precious spiritual hopes and 
treasures of all mankind. 



historical significance of the baptists 47 

Soul Freedom Always Held by the Baptists. 

There is no evidence that Baptists came to their 
view of soul freedom and separation of Church and 
State gradually. There is nowhere a wavering note 
on this great theme. It seems to have been a di- 
vinely given prophetic insight into the meaning of 
the gospel and the implicit teaching of Scripture. 
Mark the phrase, implicit teaching. For Scripture 
nowhere enjoins in so many words separation of 
Church and State. It required spiritual discernment 
to discover the doctrine, prophetic insight of a high 
order, and yet when once discovered by the unbiased 
mind it was accepted as a self-evident truth. 

We need only to consider the historic background 
in order to estimate at its true value this great in- 
sight. After Constantine until Pope Gregory VII 
there had been a struggle for supremacy between 
Church and State. In Gregory the spirit of the 
Roman Church became incarnate and conquered. He 
made the Emperor Henry do penance by standing 
in the snow with bare feet at Canossa, and he worte 
his memorable letter to William the Conqueror to 
the effect that the State was subordinate to the 
Church, that the power of the State as compared 
with that of the Church was as the moon compared 
with the sun. For many generations the figure of 
Gregory filled the imagination of Europe, and even 
to-day he is a potent force there. Neither Luther 
nor Calvin hesitated to resort to the arm of civil 



48 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

power when they deemed it necessary to enforce 
religion. The great Reformers did not rise to the 
conception of separation of Church and State. In 
those days it was left to the persecuted Anabaptists 
to make this prophetic deliverance. But they were 
hounded to death, and in Europe seemed almost to 
disappear from the face of the earth. 

In England even to-day our Baptist and Non- 
conformist brethren are battling for religious equal- 
ity ; and so recent and able a statesman as Gladstone 
wrote a book to prove that the propagation of 
religion is a function of the State. 

Religious Toleration Not Liberty. 

In the American colonies apart from Rhode Island 
and Virginia, where Baptists led the way, the near- 
est approach to the true ideal was one form or 
another of religious toleration. The story is a 
familiar one and need not be recited again here. 
Suffice it to say that in no American colony save in 
the two mentioned was there even an effort made to 
establish religious liberty in the true sense. In the 
founding of Maryland the Calverts secured a charter 
from England which granted a certain measure of 
toleration. This, to these Roman Catholics, seemed 
indeed a great stride forward. In comparison with 
their usual insistence upon an ironclad church au- 
thority and their exclusive claim to apostolicity, 
it was a real step in advance. But the Baptists 
stood for a more thoroughgoing principle than 



HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE BAPTISTS 49 

Romanist or Protestant in their doctrine of com- 
plete separation of Church and State. Everything 
is relative. A snail complained of a tortoise : " You 
travel too fast for me!" A clod near-by said to 
the snail : " You go so fast you make me dizzy ! " 
While this colloquy was going on an eagle swept 
past overhead; but his proximity and flight never 
dawned upon clod, tortoise, or snail. Toleration and 
religious liberty are the poles apart. 

Common as was religious oppression in those 
days even the Declaration of Independence fails to 
mention it as a thing to be cast off along with other 
forms of tyranny therein enumerated. It was as 
Madison, Adams, and others said, the conception of 
a free Church in a free State was foreign to the 
general philosophy and social theories of the age. 
Men imagined that to adopt the principle would be 
to open the flood-gates to infidelity in a thousand 
forms. It was not until after the promulgation of 
the federal constitution that Congress was awakened 
to the danger of perpetuating the un-American 
theory of the union of Church and State. The 
Baptists of Virginia again took the lead. They sent 
their well-known memorial to George Washington, 
then president of the United States, and from him 
received assurance that the liberties of the people in 
religious matters would be protected. Soon after- 
ward the first amendment to the Constitution was 
enacted, forever forbidding religious tests or special 
privileges in the United States. 



50 the axioms of religion 

The Historical Significance of the Baptists. 

But it is time we take up the answer to the ques- 
tion What is the historic significance of the Baptists ? 
What great principle have they contributed to the 
religious thought and life of mankind? Or to state 
the question in a slightly different form, What inter- 
pretation of Christianity do they represent, which 
distinguishes them from all other Christian bodies? 

In replying to these questions we shall find that 
there are a number of great elementary truths, of the 
nature of axioms, which lie at the heart of the Baptist 
conception of Christianity. It is the aim of this 
book to show that these universal and self-evident 
truths are simply the expression of the universal 
elements in Christianity and thus serve as the best 
statement of what the religion of Christ is in its 
essential nature. 

What then is the distinguishing Baptist principle ? 
Is it separation of Church and State? Or is it 
the doctrine of soul freedom, the right of private 
judgment in religious matters and in the interpreta- 
tion of the Scriptures? Assuredly these are dis- 
tinctive Baptist principles, which have been held by 
no religious denomination so consistently. And yet 
they are scarcely an adequate statement by them- 
selves. Separation of Church and State may be an 
accomplished fact and yet Roman Catholicism re- 
main as the form of Christianity which survives. 
This of course means the survival of spiritual 



HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE BAPTISTS 5 1 

tyranny in the church, although the church itself 
be untrammeled by the civil power. Soul freedom 
too is but a partial statement. Freedom alone is not 
the end but the means. Self-realization through 
Christ is the end. Until freedom is thus directed 
toward its end it remains negative in meaning, it 
simply points to the broken fetters, from which it 
has escaped. Freedom by itself does not imply 
capacity for self-government, and any adequate 
statement of the New Testament teaching must 
include this. 

Again, can we claim that individualism is the pe- 
culiar teaching of the Baptists? Here again we 
touch upon a great truth which Baptists have in- 
sisted upon in a manner more thoroughgoing than 
any others. But individualism alone is inadequate 
because man is more than an individual. He is a 
social being. He has relations to his fellows in the 
Church, and in the industrial order, and in the 
State. We must comprehend these relations in 
our fundamental view. 

Justification by faith was a central principle in 
Luther's teaching, and has become a part of the 
common Christian heritage of the succeeding cen- 
turies. Baptists here share with others the posses- 
sion of a great truth. This cannot therefore be 
regarded as a doctrine peculiar to the Baptists. 

Obedience to Christ's will as revealed in the 
Scriptures has been urged as the all-inclusive Bap- 
tist principle. Dr. W. C. Wilkinson's admirable 



52 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

work on " The Baptist Principle " sets forth this 
conception in its fulness. There is a great truth 
here. Baptists rightly insist on obedience at all 
points. There are portions of Scripture which 
others have ignored or set aside. And yet it may 
be questioned whether the principle of obedience is 
quite sufficiently comprehensive to cover the case 
fully. Historically, at least, there are aspects of the 
Baptist position which come into view more clearly 
under another conception as we shall see. As a 
force in history they have borne a distinguishing 
mark which will become evident enough when duly 
considered. All evangelical denominations claim 
to obey, and in theory adopt the principle of obedi- 
ence, however much they may depart from it as 
regards infant baptism and immersion as the sole 
New Testament baptism. The Roman Catholics, 
however, deny entirely the believer's right or 
capacity to interpret and obey the Scriptures for 
himself. He maintains that the principle of in- 
dividual initiative here leads to ecclesiastical anar- 
chy. Another aspect of obedience is that it may be 
stated in a form which ignores the necessity for in- 
telligence. Obedience may be blind, or fanatical, 
and thus far from the New Testament ideal. The 
idea of obedience, therefore, would seem to require 
some qualification in order to answer all the ends 
of a comprehensive definition. 

What shall be said of regeneration? Is the doc- 
trine of regenerated church-membership the suffi- 



HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE BAPTISTS 53 

cient statement of the Baptist view? It is a view 
peculiar to Baptists, and far-reaching in its signifi- 
cance. And yet it is conceivable that the doctrine 
of a regenerated church-membership might co-exist 
alongside of a priestly or an episcopal system of 
church government. The fundamental statement 
should be at the same time duly inclusive and ex- 
clusive, and regeneration alone comes short. 

Democracy and the priesthood of all believers, 
again, have been urged as the fundamental Baptist 
view. Unquestionably they are of vital importance 
and grow directly out of our fundamental position. 
But they are corollaries to a prior truth. They are 
not original but derived. 

The sufficient statement of the historical signifi- 
cance of the Baptists is this: The competency of 
the soul in religion. Of course this means a com- 
petency under God, not a competency in the sense 
of human self-sufficiency. There is no reference 
here to the question of sin and human ability in the 
moral and theological sense, nor in the sense of 
independence of the Scriptures. I am not here 
stating the Baptist creed. On many vital matters of 
doctrine, such as the atonement, the person of Christ, 
and others Baptists are in substantial agreement 
with the evangelical world in general. It is the his- 
torical significance of the Baptists I am stating, not a 
Baptist creed. 

This conception of the competency of the soul un- 
der God in religion is both exclusive and inclusive 



54 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

in a measure which sets forth the distinctive contri- 
bution of Baptists to the religious thought of the 
race. It is of course a New Testament principle 
and carries at its heart the very essence of that con- 
ception of man's relations to God which we find in 
the teaching of Christ. 

Observe then that the idea of the competency of 
the soul in religion excludes at once all human in- 
terference, such as episcopacy and infant baptism, 
and every form of religion by proxy. Religion is a 
personal matter between the soul and God. The 
principle is at the same time inclusive of all the 
particulars which were named above and more. It 
must include the doctrine of separation of Church 
and State because State churches stand on the as- 
sumption that civil government is necessary as a 
factor in man's life in order to a fulfilment of his 
religious destiny; that man without the aid of the 
State is incompetent in religion. Justification by 
faith is also included because this doctrine is simply 
one detail in the soul's general religious heritage 
from Christ. Justification asserts man's competency 
to deal directly with God in the initial act of the 
Christian life. Regeneration is also implied in the 
principle of the soul's competency because it is the 
blessing which follows close upon the heels of justifi- 
cation or occurs at the same time with it, as a result 
of the soul's direct dealing with God. The necessity 
for a regenerated church-membership follows of 
necessity from the doctrine of the regenerated in- 



HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE BAPTISTS 55 

dividual life. The doctrine of the soul's competency, 
however, goes further than individualism in that it 
embraces capacity for action in social relations as 
well as on the part of the individual. The church 
is a group of individuals sustaining to each other 
important relations, and organized for a great end 
and mission. The idea of the soul's competency 
embraces the social as well as the individual aspect 
of religion. 

Let it be noted further that the steps we have al- 
ready traced lead directly to democracy in church 
life and the priesthood of all believers. The com- 
petency of the regenerated individual implies that at 
bottom his competency is derived from the indwell- 
ing Christ. Man's capacity for self-government in 
religion is nothing more than the authority of Christ 
exerted in and through the inner life of believers, 
with the understanding always, of course, that he 
regulates that inner life in accordance with his 
revealed word. There is no conceivable justifica- 
tion, therefore, for lodging ecclesiastical authority 
in the hands of an infallible pope or a bench of 
bishops. Democracy in church government is an 
inevitable corollary of the general doctrine of the 
soul's competency in religion. The independence 
and autonomy of the local church, therefore, is 
not merely an inference from a verse of Scripture 
here and there. It inheres in the whole philosophy 
of Christianity. Democracy in church government 
is simply Christ himself animating his own body 



56 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

through his Spirit. The decisions of the local con- 
gregation on ecclesiastical matters are the " con- 
sensus of the competent.'' 

The priesthood of all believers, again, is but the 
expression of the soul's competency on the Godward, 
as democracy is its expression on the ecclesiastical 
side of its religious life. No human priest may claim 
to be mediator between the soul and God because no 
possible reason can be assigned for any competency 
on his part not common to all believers. 

The principle of obedience also takes its place 
as a very important particular under the general 
conception of the soul's competency. The principle 
of competency itself meets the Roman Catholic plea 
against direct individual obedience to the Scriptures 
on the ground of the man's incapacity to interpret 
Scripture for himself. The right of private judg- 
ment as to the meaning of the Bible is of course 
another aspect of the same great truth. 

General Summary. 

The reader will observe that what we are main- 
taining is that the doctrine of the soul's competency 
in religion under God is the historical significance 
of the Baptists. We may restate the Baptist position 
in the various relations as follows: The biblical 
significance of the Baptists is the right of private 
interpretation and obedience to the Scriptures. The 
significance of the Baptists in relation to the in- 
dividual is soul freedom. The ecclesiastical signifi- 



HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE BAPTISTS $? 

cance of the Baptists is a regenerated church-mem- 
bership and the equality and priesthood of believers. 
The political significance of the Baptists is the sep- 
aration of Church and State. But as comprehending 
all the above particulars, as a great and aggressive 
force in Christian history, as distinguished from all 
others and standing entirely alone, the doctrine 
of the soul's competency in religion under God is the 
distinctive historical significance of the Baptists. 

It thus appears that the doctrine of the soul's 
competency in religion is a comprehensive truth. 
It unites and concentrates in itself indeed three great 
streams of tendency in modern times. The first is 
the intellectual principle of the Renaissance, man's 
capacity and right in the exercise of mental free- 
dom. The second is the Anglo-Saxon principle 
of individualism which has been so potent a political 
force in modern times. The third is the Reforma- 
tion principle, justification by faith. Baptists, how- 
ever, have changed all these tendencies and modified 
them by elevating them into nobler forms and made 
them more fruitful. In their insistence upon man's 
competency in religion they have saved intellectual 
freedom from all forms of human repression and 
at the same time safeguarded it by relating it to 
man's true goal, the Intelligence behind the visible 
universe. Human intellect illumined by the Divine 
intellect is the Baptist view. In their advocacy of 
individualism they have saved the Anglo-Saxon 
principle from the ruthlessly selfish tendency by de- 



58 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

fining it as a moral and religious impulse under the 
direct tutelage of the moral leader of mankind — 
Jesus Christ. Moreover, they have carried the Ref- 
ormation principle of justification by faith far 
beyond the dreams of Luther and the other re- 
formers. All that is implicit in the justification 
principle they have advocated. The long struggle 
for religious liberty and separation of Church and 
State which Baptists have led, has been the unfold- 
ing consistently of a greater ideal than that cher- 
ished by Luther, which has gathered up into a 
larger unity all the moral and spiritual treasures 
of the Reformation itself. 

Now this principle of the competency of the soul 
under God in religion, like all other radical views 
of man or nature has its underlying philosophy. 
For the present we may indicate that philosophy 
by asserting that the principle of competency as- 
sumes that man is made in God's image, and that 
God is a person able to reveal himself to man, or 
Christian theism. Man has capacity for God, and 
God can communicate with man. This philosophy 
of course underlies the total Christian movement. 
The incarnation of God in Christ is the one great 
historic expression of it. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE SOUL'S COMPETENCY IN RELIGION 

It is in order now to point out how the claim in 
the preceding chapter may be made good. If the 
principle of the competency of the soul in religion 
under God is a distinctive Baptist contribution to 
the world's thought, a vital element in the Baptist 
message to the race, then it ought to appear to be 
such when compared with the points of view of 
various other Christian bodies. Under this pro- 
cess of comparison I think the candid reader will 
recognize without difficulty that this is a distin- 
guishing mark of the Baptists. He will also per- 
ceive its simplicity, and indeed universality as an 
underlying assumption in New Testament Chris- 
tianity, while at the same time he will discover in it 
a comprehensive criterion of judgment for classify- 
ing the various existing ecclesiastical bodies of 
Christendom. 

Romanists and the Soul's Competency in 
Religion. 
First, then, compare the principle of the com- 
petency of the soul in religion with Roman Catholi- 
cism. It can be shown historically without the 
slightest difficulty that the formative principle of 

59 



60 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

the Roman Catholic system is the direct antithesis 
to the doctrine of the soul's competency. Roman- 
ism, in other words, asserts at every point the soul's 
incompetency in religion. From beginning to end 
Romanism conceives of the human spirit as de- 
pendent in religion upon other human spirits. It 
regards the soul as incompetent to deal alone with 
God. This is not only the outward expression and 
practical result of the Roman hierarchical system ; it 
is also the avowed theory of the church, proclaimed 
without hesitation. The laity are dependent upon 
the priesthood. Each lower order in the hierarchy 
is dependent upon the next above it, and all together 
are under the necessity of drawing instruction for 
the intellect and the rule for the moral and re- 
ligious life from the infallible head of the church in 
Rome. 

In every particular of the ecclesiastical and re- 
ligious life of the Roman Catholic, the soul's in- 
competency is assumed. All the seven sacraments 
illustrate the statement in a striking way. The soul's 
capacity to deal with Christ and receive revelation 
at his hands is denied in baptism. For through bap- 
tism alone as administered by the authorized priest- 
hood (save in certain emergencies) can the re- 
generating efficacy of Christianity reach the soul. 
Outside the church is no salvation. Christ and the 
soul alone are not equal to the redemptive task. The 
only competent hands are human and priestly. The 
same principle inheres in the administration of the 



THE SOUL'S COMPETENCY IN RELIGION 6l 



Lord's Supper. Its power is nothing until the ele- 
ments are changed by the priestly touch into the 
body and blood of Christ. Communion with Christ 
is thus taken out of the realm of spirit and trans- 
ferred to the realm of matter, and the material ele- 
ments necessary to the communion are held in the 
form of an ecclesiastical monopoly by a human 
priesthood. Auricular confession also assumes that 
in prayer man is incompetent to deal directly with 
God. A human priest must pronounce absolution. 
The penance also which the priest imposes raises a 
barrier between the broken heart and the forgiving 
Father in heaven, and asserts that his pardoning love 
instead of rolling in like a tide upon the penitent 
soul expands and contracts in accordance with the 
severity or leniency of an erring human mediator. 
Again, Christ cannot call a man into his ministry, 
and no man can respond to that call, outside the line 
of apostolic succession. The sacrament of orders 
limits Christ's ministry to an ecclesiastical chain 
which at no point must be broken, and at once pro- 
nounces the decree of condemnation upon all others, 
and asserts that the alleged direct call into the minis- 
try from Christ himself is a delusion. 

The sacrament of extreme unction, which is ap- 
plied to the dying is another form of the Romanist 
assertion of the soul's incompetency. God's grace in 
the heart cannot fit a man for the exodus through 
death out of this life into the next. Not until the 
priest, with oil consecrated by the bishop, has an- 



62 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



ointed the dying in the figure of the cross, on eyes, 
ears, nostrils, mouth, the palms of the hands and 
soles of the feet, is the soul prepared to make its exit. 
The soul is thus made competent for death only 
through priestly mediation. The fetters of this 
bondage to a mortal and human priesthood are not 
broken even when death has severed spirit from 
body; for even then the gates of purgatory fly open 
only through priestly intercession upon earth. 

And finally the doctrine of papal infallibility com- 
bined with that of an authoritative tradition forbids 
all private or divergent interpretations of Scripture. 
To discover and proclaim an interpretation of the 
word of God which contravenes in any essential par- 
ticular that which bears the stamp of traditional or 
papal approval, is for the Catholic to invoke upon his 
head the anathema of the church. 

Thus from beginning to end and throughout 
its very fiber Romanism rears its ecclesiastical 
structure on the denial of the soul's competency in 
religion. There is not a leaf on this vast tree which 
is not ribbed and modeled in rigid obedience to its 
one constructive ideal, the soul's incapacity to attend 
to religion for itself. While not desiring in the 
slightest measure to abate the value or importance 
of the good Roman Catholicism has done in its be- 
nevolent and philanthropic work, one is compelled 
to say that in its ecclesiastical theory it is not only 
against the spirit of human development and prog- 
ress, but is inconsistent with the Christianity of 



THE SOUL'S COMPETENCY IN RELIGION 63 

Christ. If there is any one thing which stands out 
above others in crystal clearness in the New Testa- 
ment it is Christ's doctrine of the soul's capacity, 
right, and privilege to approach God directly and 
transact with him in religion. 

Protestantism Also Inconsistent. 

We look next at the Baptist principle of the com- 
petency of the soul in religion in its relation to 
Protestantism in general. We find here, of course, 
important modifications of the case as it stands with 
Roman Catholicism. But all the churches which ad- 
here to infant baptism or episcopacy in any form 
come short of the New Testament principle in cer- 
tain important respects. These bodies in fact repre- 
sent a dualistic Christianity. They attempt to com- 
bine the Romish principle of incompetency with the 
antithetic principle of competency. In insisting 
upon the doctrine of justification by faith they rec- 
ognize the principle of competency; but in retain- 
ing infant baptism or episcopacy they introduce the 
opposite view. Infant baptism takes away from the 
child its privilege of individual initiative in salva- 
tion and lodges in the hands of parents or sponsors 
the impossible task of performing an act of religious 
obedience for another. Such a view is as an axe 
laid to the root of obedience, and destroys its essen- 
tial nature as such. 

It thus appears that current Protestantism at- 
tempts to harmonize two principles which are es- 



64 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

sentially contradictory to each other. There are in 
other words two ways of being saved, and two ways 
of entering a Presbyterian or Episcopal church. 
One way is by personal obedience. The applicant 
for church-membership who has not been baptized 
relates a Christian experience which of course in- 
volves justification by faith in Christ. He is re- 
ceived and baptized upon this profession of faith 
and thus obeys for himself. Another, who was bap- 
tized in infancy, also applies for church-membership 
and is received on the strength of that baptism. 
In the one case the candidate obeyed for himself, 
in the other his sponsors obeyed for him. The two 
principles are fundamentally opposed. It is not sur- 
prising, therefore, that Pedobaptist churches have 
great difficulty in explaining the status of baptized 
infants in the church. Are they church-members or 
not? New England Congregationalists struggled 
over the question for a long time in colonial days, 
and they have never attained a satisfactory solu- 
tion of the problem as we shall see in a later chapter. 
The same difficulties exist to-day in all Pedobap- 
tist denominations. No intelligible view of the 
status of baptized infants in the church can possibly 
be set forth which does not contradict the doctrine of 
justification by faith and personal obedience which 
is also held by these same churches. The reason is 
that in the one case the competency of the soul in 
religion is affirmed — that is, in justification by faith 
and personal obedience ; and in the other that com- 



THE SOUL'S COMPETENCY IN RELIGION 65 

petency is denied — that is, in infant baptism and 
sponsorial or parental obedience. 

The New Testament principle of the soul's com- 
petency is violated also in all forms of church 
polity which retain episcopacy and any other form of 
ecclesiastical oligarchy. But as the principle of de- 
mocracy in church government is to receive at- 
tention in later chapters, further discussion of this 
point is omitted here. 

In concluding our remarks on the relation of the 
Baptist doctrine of the soul's competency in re- 
ligion to Pedobaptist ideas, it is only necessary to 
remark that the latter adopt at one point and con- 
tradict at another a principle which reaches its ful- 
ness in the Baptist polity and general view of Chris- 
tianity. The Baptists have consistently applied the 
principle at every point. Their aim is to restore 
original Christianity in its completeness to the 
human race. 

The Soul's Competency and Modern Progress. 

We must consider next the relation of the doctrine 
of competency to modern life and progress. This 
also will be discussed in later portions of the book. 
Meantime a few words by way of general outline. 
Properly understood the doctrine of the soul's com- 
petency in religion is the summary of our progres- 
sive life and civilization. The religious principle is 
always the dominant force which gives its leading 
characteristics to any civilization. The competency 

E 



66 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

of man in religion is the competency of man every- 
where. Every significant movement of our day is 
one form or another of that high purpose of man 
to make his way back to God. Art is simply the as- 
sertion of man's inherent capacity for beauty, the 
claim that he is competent to trace out in time all 
the subtle lines of grace, all the varied hues and 
forms of a manifold and wonder-crowded universe. 
Art is simply the march of the beauty lover along 
the highways of a variegated creation, forward and 
upward until he stands face to face with Him who 
is the infinitely Beautiful. 

Science is the corresponding quest for truth, the 
assertion that the soul was made for truth, its com- 
petency to find and its capacity for truth, its death- 
less struggle for truth until it stands in the presence 
of Him who is the Truth. 

Agnosticism a Belated Philosophy. 

Philosophy also simply asserts the competency of 
man in the realm of speculative thought. Christian 
theism is the only possible philosophy for the man 
who accepts our fundamental principle of the soul's 
competency. For it asserts God's ability to commu- 
nicate a revelation to man and man's capacity to 
receive it and to communicate with God. Agnos- 
ticism, which denies the competency of the human 
intellect, is the Roman Catholicism of philosophy, 
and is a belated view of human ability in the intel- 
lectual sphere. Many who lean toward agnosticism 



THE SOUL'S COMPETENCY IN RELIGION 67 

in their theological attitude need to reexamine their 
foundations and discover its real intellectual and 
spiritual affinities. 

Again, politics and government and the social 
institutions assume man's moral competency, his 
capacity for moral progress under God in a well- 
ordered society. Society is the bold assertion that 
under God's leadership eternal right will be attained 
in the human sphere. If you let the gold and the 
pearl stand for the highest moral values ; if you let 
the walls of jasper and their twelve foundations 
stand for the reign of moral law ; if you let the sun- 
less yet resplendent heavens above stand for the light 
and glory of truth in its triumph in the human soul ; 
and if you let the hallelujahs of the tearless and 
shadowless and triumphant multitude in white stand 
for a purified social order, then you have in the 
unmatched glory and beauty of the New Jerusalem 
which the prophet saw descending from heaven to 
earth, the fitting symbol of what is going on in the 
world all about us — man under God achieving for 
himself an ideal social order. The absence of the 
temple from the perfected city means that all life 
will become a temple, all its manifestations an act of 
worship. The absence of the sun means that all 
light and all truth are now ours through the indwell- 
ing God. The absence of labor from the city means 
that now achievement is spontaneous. Culture, 
religion, morality, are all blended into a perfect 
harmony of achieving and progressing humanity. 



68 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



The Fountain of Discontent. 

It is man's deathless conviction of his competency 
to achieve this goal that opens in his bosom the 
fountain of eternal discontent. A symbol of his 
progress toward his goal is a sculptor carving out 
of the marble his vision, rejoicing in it for a time, 
and then destroying it or setting it aside and be- 
ginning his work on another block and making a 
better statue ; forever achieving and yet forever re- 
pudiating his achievement until he achieves the 
image of God in himself through God's grace. All 
this and more is implicit in our view of the com- 
petency of the soul in religion. America is the 
arena which God has supplied for the free and full 
play of the principle, and from here it is destined to 
spread until it covers the earth. 

It will be observed that man's competency as thus 
outlined is a competency under God. In religion the 
counterpart of this truth is God's revelation in Christ, 
the divine competency, so to speak, to approach man 
on the basis of his divinely constituted human na- 
ture, and in keeping with his mental and moral 
faculties. All the history of religion shows that 
without the divine initiative, without revelation, 
without grace, man failed to find God. His com- 
petency, therefore, is not apart from God's approach 
to him but only in and through that approach. The 
Scriptures are the record of God's approach to man 
in Christ. These become to us the medium through 



THE SOUL'S COMPETENCY IN RELIGION 69 

which truth finds us, and without them Christ would 
inevitably pass into eclipse, and men would wander 
helpless, like a rudderless ship driven by tide and 
tempest. He would thus repeat the sad failures of 
the past, seen in all the superstitious, and ceremonial, 
and speculative attempts to find God. 



CHAPTER V 

THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

Having examined the principles of the kingdom 
of God in their broad outlines, and having sought 
to discover the general significance of the Baptists 
in history, and having summed up that significance 
in the doctrine of the soul's competency in religion, 
we come next to examine in a more extended way 
the essential elements of the Baptist message to 
mankind. Hitherto in our Baptist literature there 
has been exhibited a vast amount of minute and 
careful exegesis of the New Testament passages 
which support our claims as to the form and mean- 
ing of baptism, the nature and significance of the 
Lord's Supper, and the constitution and order of 
the church, and related subjects. The exegetical 
basis for our plea has been wrought with such suc- 
cess, indeed, that we may assert with the utmost 
confidence that the scholarship of the world, taken 
as a whole, stands with us in our conclusions. 

We have reached a point in our history, however, 
at which it is fitting that our message and our mis- 
sion be interpreted anew. This is not because the 
older plea has lost its force or that it will cease to 
be necessary in the future, but rather because we 
have come to a period of Christian thought in which 
70 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 71 



another kind of plea will appeal to many minds with 
far greater force than the old, and because the inner 
logic of our Baptist principles demands unfolding 
into their larger implications. 

Baptists Often Misunderstood. 

Another thing: Baptists are, even yet, quite too 
generally misunderstood. For example, one charges : 
" The Baptists invert the pyramid of Christianity and 
try to make it stand on its apex instead of its base, 
by holding as their chief interest the question oi 
whether there is much or little water in baptism." 
A Baptist smiles at this misconstruction of our 
views, but it is quite prevalent. Another says: 
" Baptists evince a lack of the sense of proportion 
in their exaggerated emphasis of their doctrine of 
communion." This of course is also erroneous, a 
misconception of us and our real position. 

A recent speaker has said that in our claim that 
the New Testament teaches the congregational 
polity we have relied in our exegesis on a very few 
questionable passages; that we have taken a very 
small bit of exegetical dough, so to speak, and, 
with our controversial roller, we have flattened it 
out so thin that it is scarcely strong enough to form 
the crust of our denominational pie! So that we 
are, according to these various objectors, deficient 
in religious architecture, spiritual art, and theologi- 
cal cookery. All of which are serious charges. 
Now let me say at once that the Baptists have won 



72 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



their contention on the following points: Baptism 
by immersion, believers' baptism, and congrega- 
tional polity. The scholarship of the world is prac- 
tically a unit in the view that the New Testament 
teaches just what the Baptists hold on these points. 
Our plea falls sometimes on unresponsive ears be- 
cause men have lost interest in the baptismal and 
communion question in some communities. 

Now it may be questioned whether the Baptists 
have ever set forth all the contents of their message 
to the world. At the bottom of our Pandora's box 
there may lie neglected greater things than those 
which have been taken out. The pressure of contro- 
versy has kept two or three things to the front to 
the exclusion of greater things. 

A Fresh Analysis Needed. 

What, then, do we need? We need a transfer of 
emphasis. We need a fresh analysis of our funda- 
mental principles. We need to reverse the shield of 
our denominational beliefs and see what is on the 
other side, and then we need to proclaim what we 
find there with the same earnestness and zeal which 
have marked our conduct in the past. This does not 
mean of course that we are to abandon the old 
positions, or cease our plea for baptism and church 
order, but only that we must enlarge our message 
and make it complete. 

I propose, then, as a new defense of our Baptist 
position a restatement of our views from a higher 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 73 

standpoint, or to go back to the former figure, to 
look on the other side of our denominational shield. 
I will put my plea in the form of six brief proposi- 
tions, and I will predict for them at the outset three 
things. First, that the reader will concede that 
they accord with the teachings of the New Testa- 
ment. Secondly, that they will be so simple and 
self-evident that our Methodist and Presbyterian 
and Episcopalian friends will all accept them. In- 
deed they are self-evident. They are the axioms 
of religion. The instructed religious conscious- 
ness cannot and will not repudiate them, however 
inconsistent men may be in applying them. The 
third thing that I predict is that you will recognize 
that these axioms of Christianity grow out of the 
mother principle for which Baptists have stood 
through the ages, as set forth, viz., The competency 
of the soul in religion under God. These six simple 
propositions are as six branches from that one trunk 
of New Testament teaching. Let us come, then, 
to the axioms. I will give them all first, and will 
follow the statement with remarks about them. 

The Axioms of Religion. 

i. The theological axiom: The holy and loving 
God has a right to be sovereign. 

2. The religious axiom: All souls have an equal 
right to direct access to God. 

3. The ecclesiastical axiom: All believers have a 
right to equal privileges in the church. 



74 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



4. The moral axiom : To be responsible man must 
be free. 

5. The religio-civic axiom: A free Church in a 
free State. 

6. The social axiom: Love your neighbor as 
yourself. 1 

Now my claim is that these are axioms ; they are 
to those who accept Christianity at all self-evident. 
Indeed, they will not be denied so far as they are 
general principles by any evangelical Christian or 
intelligent unbeliever. They are the very alphabet 
of the Christian religion. Understand me. They do 
not exhaust the specific beliefs as to the Scriptures, 
Christ, the church, the ordinances. They are not an 
exhaustive creed. They are rather the great New 
Testament assumptions, which are the very basis 
of our Baptist faith. What we wish the world to 
see is that our conception of the church and of 
Christianity rests upon an impregnable foundation. 

I remark further that no religious organization 
so consistently embodies all these axiomatic princi- 
ples in its life and doctrine as the Baptists. 

In calling the above statements axioms the intelli- 
gent reader will understand that I do not employ the 
word in its strict mathematical sense. The truths 
set forth, however, are in the moral and religious 
sphere what axioms are in mathematics. That is to 
say, when the meaning of the various terms is 

* The form of statement in axioms five and six is varied for the 
sake of simplicity and conciseness. 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 75 



clearly grasped there will be no protest or objection 
in the reader's mind. I make bold to say that in 
America no member of any of those churches known 
as " evangelical " will dissent from any of the prin- 
ciples enunciated in this list of six axioms. In- 
deed, it is believed that the great multitude of unbe- 
lievers—men who reject Christianity as held by the 
evangelical- bodies, but who are theists, believers in 
a personal God to whom man is responsible, will also 
admit these axioms. I do not of course suppose 
that all Roman Catholics will yield assent to these 
propositions save in a most abstract and general 
way. Romanism forbids more. Such of them as 
grasp clearly the principles of Romanism will com- 
bat them just as they do the whole Protestant 
standpoint of the right of private judgment in re- 
ligion. Romanism, against the whole modern view 
of man, assumes the incompetency of the soul in 
religion. Doubtless also those in European coun- 
tries who are wedded to the theory of a union of 
Church and State will repudiate the religio- civic 
axiom. But the cases of the Romanist and of the 
man who favors a religious establishment may for 
the purpose of our discussion be treated as ex- 
ceptional. On the other hand it may be asserted 
freely that the religious and intellectual growth of 
the great Protestant world since the Reformation 
has been such that, with the qualifications just made, 
the six axioms will meet with a hearty and favorable 
response. 



7& THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



A Basis of Agreement. 

It will doubtless come as a surprise to many to be 
told that on the basis of the universal assumptions 
of the gospel of the kingdom of God as revealed 
through Christ, Baptists can set forth their distinct- 
ive and fundamental positions in terms which are 
acceptable to all evangelical believers. The author 
rejoices that this is true for several reasons. He 
is glad that there are so many of the essential and 
fundamental things of the gospel on which there is 
at least theoretical agreement. These things ought 
to serve as a fresh starting-point for the considera- 
tion of the whole subject of Christian union; and 
if they may in any measure serve this end I shall 
feel that a real service has been rendered. The se- 
quel will show, however, that in the application and 
interpretation of these axioms of religion there is 
radical and wide divergence of view among the 
various Christian bodies. The chief task of the 
chapters which follow will be to show that Baptists 
have more consistently than any other evangelical 
body carried out these principles in their polity and 
life. It will appear, indeed, that the plea of Bap- 
tists is a plea for the religious rights of mankind. 
No body of people is farther in essential spirit and 
aim from a narrow sectarianism. Everything which 
they hold as distinguishing them from others is, 
so to speak, a plank in the platform of the chartered 
religious rights of mankind, as revealed in and 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 77 



through Jesus Christ. The six axioms, taken in con- 
nection with the fundamental general principle out 
of which they spring— the competency of the soul 
in religion under God— may be regarded as the 
platform of human rights in religion. 

Axioms Embody Laws of the Kingdom. 

This last statement is justified by the fact that all 
the axiomatic truths announced are in complete 
harmony with the ideals of the kingdom of God 
as outlined in a previous chapter ; indeed they are an 

I interpretation in universal terms of the contents 
of the laws of the kingdom. The law of Salvation, 
the law of Worship, the law of Edification, the law 
of Liberty, the law of Brotherhood and Interdepend- 

I ence, the law of Filial Service, the law of Holiness, 
all these find interpretation and explication in the 
" Axioms of Religion." All this, I think, will be- 
come increasingly clear as we proceed. Meantime 
we submit our axioms as the " Principia, ,, the first 
truths of the Christian religion, just as the laws of 
the uniformity of nature and of universal causation 
are among the first truths of science. They are to re- 
ligion what the alphabet is to literature, what the law 
of affinity is to chemistry, and what the law of gravi- 
tation is to astronomy. The essential meaning of 
these truths in relation to our Baptist position and in 
relation to universal Christianity will appear as we 
study them from various standpoints in the chapters 
which follow. As "first truths" in the proper 



78 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



sense of the word, that is, as fundamental assump- 
tions, they will appear to be harmonious with all 
other truths including the cardinal doctrines of the 
incarnation and atonement of Christ and related 
teachings. 

In conclusion we remark that the conception of 
the competency of the soul in religion under God, 
along with the axioms of religion, express the truths 
and ideals which lie at the heart of all man's higher 
strivings to-day. These truths are so obvious when 
once understood, so inspiring, so self-evident, that 
the hungering spirit of man seizes upon them as 
upon the pearl of great price. They shine in their 
own light. Men can no more deny them than they 
can deny the beauty of an orchid, or gainsay the 
transparency of a crystal, or criticize the note of a 
nightingale, or deny the splendor of the milky way. 
They fall under God's blessing, like notes out of a 
seraph's song upon the ears of men. They catch 
and enrapture us and are destined to lead the race 
to greater heights than any yet attained. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE THEOLOGICAL AXIOM : THE HOLY AND LOVING 
GOD HAS A RIGHT TO BE SOVEREIGN 

In view of the fact that various meanings are 
often attached by different people to the same re- 
ligious terms it is necessary to explain, as concisely 
as may be, the meaning and development of the 
axioms in their order. This we shall attempt in the 
next few chapters. 

We begin with the theological axiom : 

Character the Basis of Sovereignty. 

A holy and loving God has the right to be 
sovereign. Men have ever stumbled at the doctrine 
of God's sovereignty, chiefly because they have not 
understood it. They have thought it meant that 
God was merely a predestinating omnipotence, that 
he is capricious lightning, a meteor God, moving 
across the heavens of man's hope in a lawless man- 
ner, smiting one and saving another, without regard 
to moral law. They have thought of him as 
sovereign omnipotence or as sovereign omnis- 
cience instead of sovereign fatherhood, as he is. 
If he is holy and loving, if he has character, he 
has a right to be sovereign. We may say indeed 
that men find little or no difficulty in accepting the 

79 



8o 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



idea of the sovereignty of God so soon as they rec- 
ognize character behind sovereignty. Indeed, as a 
matter of logic there is not standing room in the in- 
tellect of man for any theory which is opposed to 
the idea of God's sovereignty. Men have revolted 
at a sovereignty which seemed to them to be unfair 
in its choice of some to salvation to the exclusion of 
others. But that this objection was not directed 
against the idea of the sovereignty itself, but against 
the results of its operation in saving some men and 
not all, is seen in this, that the doctrine of the sover- 
eignty has been made to do service in the interest of 
a universal salvation. Dr. Geo. A. Gordon in his 
book " The Christ of To-day," and elsewhere, ex- 
pounds a doctrine of divine sovereignty which is 
avowedly drawn from the teachings of Jonathan 
Edwards. But Edwards would, if he could behold 
Doctor Gordon's application of his doctrine, be far 
from accepting it. For it is in the latter's hands 
made to operate as the principle of a universal sal- 
vation. Thus we see that so soon as sovereignty 
takes the form of love, and particularly a love which 
saves all, men do not object to it, but rather hail it 
with delight. That is to say, character vindicates 
sovereignty. 

There are two sides, however, to God's character. 
He 1S holiness as well as love. There are condi- 
tions also wrapped up in human freedom, the mark 
of moral character in man correlative to sovereignty 
in God, which affect the operation of God's sover- 



THE THEOLOGICAL AXIOM 8 1 



eignty. Doctor Gordon ignores these in his argu- 
ment to show that sovereign love must necessarily 
result in the salvation of all. Nevertheless it re- 
mains true that character is the vindication of 
sovereignty. 

Nature and Man. 

We may approach the same truth from another 
side. Modern philosophy and science have empha- 
sized in a remarkable manner the helplessness of man 
in the order of nature. He is an atom played upon 
by irresistible forces external to himself. The reign 
of law in nature and the inviolability of the natural 
order have greatly enhanced the plausibility of this 
view. Thus many hold to a most rigid form of 
determinism based on natural law. The idea of the 
freedom of the will is scouted. Man is the puppet 
and the sport of a sovereignty of material forces. 
He is a bit of matter, serving as a brick in the temple 
of nature, with other material bricks above and be- 
low him. From that perpendicular and rigid wall 
there is no escape. 

Matthew Arnold improved slightly upon this idea 
when he described the mighty force outside of man 
which played continually upon him, as " the power 
not ourselves which makes for righteousness." The 
element of progress in Arnold's view is that it rec- 
ognizes that the power not ourselves is moral. This 
is a step toward making it personal. For an im- 
personal power can scarcely be regarded as " mak- 

F 



82 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



ing for righteousness." Righteousness is an attri- 
bute of personality. 

The Mohammedan makes of God a personal being 
but leaves him immoral. " God is great " is the 
sum of the Mohammedan ideal of God. To the 
Moslem, therefore, God is a predestinating omnipo- 
tence merely. 

It is seen at once what an immense stride forward 
is made in the idea of God when the conception of 
an external force urged by science and philosophy, 
plus the attribute of righteousness as advocated by 
Arnold, plus the omnipotent Person of Moham- 
medanism, has added to it the idea of holiness and 
love, and the idea of God becomes that of the holy 
and loving Person. 

The process, however, is not yet completed. For 
this analysis of the idea of sovereignty into its con- 
stituent parts of holiness, love, and personality, 
finds strong corroboration in the experience of the 
spiritually mature. No demand of the mature Chris- 
tian life is more imperious than the demand for a 
sovereignty in God which takes the form of holy 
and loving fatherhood. The mature Christian con- 
sciousness not only tolerates, it demands it. Life, 
in its blindness and helplessness, in its sorrow and 
its suffering, would be intolerable without the solace 
of the belief in holy and loving and sovereign father- 
hood. The eye of faith discerns clearly that the only 
safe hands into which the affairs of the universe 
may be entrusted are those of God himself. 



THE THEOLOGICAL AXIOM 83 



The Incarnation and Sovereignty. 

Now sovereignty expressed in terms of love and 
righteousness is the outstanding fact of the gos- 
pel. The incarnation of God in Christ is the greatest 
of all conceivable expressions of that sovereignty. 
It is the expression of a sovereignty of power, in- 
deed, but it is most of all an expression of the 
sovereignty of character, the sovereignty of holy 
and loving fatherhood. Its very essence is that the 
Father gave the Son, and that the Son came to re- 
veal the Father. Thus God manifests his sover- 
eignty in the first instance by taking the initiative 
in salvation, and this initial expression of sover- 
eignty in which he approaches man and reveals 
himself and pleads with man to be reconciled unto 
himself through the revealing Son is the index to 
all his sovereignty, a sample, so to speak, which re- 
veals what sovereignty is in its deepest essence. 
A dewdrop on the grass is like other drops of water 
until seen from the right angle of observation. 
Then it mirrors and reflects the sun. Christ's spot- 
less humanity as a finite drop of dew reflects the 
glory of sovereign holiness and sovereign love tak- 
ing the initiative in saving men. 

In discussing our moral axiom there will be oc- 
casion to make our plea for human freedom. At 
present we anticipate it sufficiently to say that any 
doctrine of divine sovereignty must safeguard man's 
freedom. The sovereignty of holy and loving char- 



8 4 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



acter, indeed, expresses itself in constituting man as 
a free moral being. Sin came in and human nature 
became so biased that, without God's prevenient 
grace the will inevitably chooses evil. But neither 
prevenient nor regenerating grace, nor grace in any 
of its forms acts upon the will by way of compulsion, 
but always in accordance with its freedom. The 
will responds and man chooses for himself God's 
freely offered gift of salvation. Grace conforms to 
the structure of the will, pursues its windings, in- 
flates but never forces it, fills it out as a human hand 
fits or fills a glove, the two forever distinct and 
separate, yet identical in shape and united in destiny. 

God's Method Necessarily Slow. 

Now it is because of this necessity for the re- 
sponse of the human will that God's sovereignty in 
saving men must needs pursue a slow method. 
He might save all men outright by a nod, if salvation 
were merely a question of power. But it is also a 
question of holy and loving character in God and of 
freedom in man. Persuasion is necessary to con- 
vince men. Human agents of redemption, preachers 
and teachers of the gospel of his grace, are organic- 
ally bound up in the process of redemption. Moral 
and spiritual laws, by their very nature, are only by 
slow degrees incorporated into human character and 
human society. The process is like the slow knitting 
together of the parts of a broken bone, or the weav- 
ing, thread by thread, of a delicate and beautiful 



THE THEOLOGICAL AXIOM 85 



fabric on a loom, or like the slow unfolding of the 
first germ of life in the seed into the stately and 
beautiful plant. Only where these require hours or 
days the spiritual process requires millenniums. 

Now God's election of men to salvation is not the 
arbitrary or capricious thing which some of the 
older and extreme forms of the doctrine of sover- 
eignty taught. It is infinite wisdom, grace, and skill, 
seeking to save the world by the method which 
will reach the greatest number in the shortest time. 
This explains the fact that election is a widening 
process. From generation to generation the hori- 
zon broadens and increasing numbers enter the king- 
dom. Holiness thus vindicates itself in that God re- 
fuses to violate man's moral nature, even in order to 
save him; and love vindicates itself in that the proc- 
ess of saving men is accelerated as much as possible 
at every stage. The limitations upon God are im- 
posed by a threefold necessity : first, of saving man 
and at the same time leaving him free, which really 
means that salvation is a moral process and not a 
mere physical act of power; second, the necessity 
of reaching the human will while it is in such a state 
of sin as will certainly lead it to exercise its moral 
freedom by the choice of evil unless restrained 
therefrom; and thirdly, the necessity of employing 
human agents as channels of his saving grace. 
Unless God does so employ human agents he takes 
man's moral task away from him, robs him of his 
chief birthright. If God should save men and 



86 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



sanctify them directly, if there were no interdepend- 
ence among men in moral and spiritual effort, no 
struggle, no suffering, no toil and effort to save 
others, the mainspring of real moral growth would 
be broken. If salvation were a direct miracle, and 
sanctification God's immediate act upon each saved 
man without the necessity for the various agencies 
and appliances of the kingdom as we know it, it 
is quite true that many a heartbreak would be 
avoided, and the long-drawn agony of a creation 
which groaneth and travaileth in pain together 
would cease. But it would be at fearful cost. Man's 
moral freedom, man's privilege of growth, the 
cultivation of the social virtues, in short man's op- 
portunity for achieving through God's grace a right- 
eousness of his own in addition to God's imparted 
righteousness would be gone forever. Thus the race 
would become spiritually bankrupt, and remain for- 
ever in a state of spiritual childhood. The redemp- 
tive enterprise is God's spiritual gymnasium where 
giants are made. Only an apparatus which provides 
for grappling with sin develops the highest spiritual 
power. The ability to wield planets and stars would 
be child's play in comparison. 

Man's Freedom and Election. 

^ Recurring now to the threefold necessity which 
limits holy and loving sovereignty in saving and 
sanctifying men— man's freedom, his inevitable 
choice of evil, and the necessity for human agents 



THE THEOLOGICAL AXIOM 87 



of redemption— we may say that election was the 
only method left to God under the conditions im- 
posed by these necessities. This method of election 
is relieved of all appearance of arbitrariness or of un- 
fairness, when it is seen that it alone would meet the 
situation. If, in addition, we suppose that God be- 
gan the electing process at the most favorable period 
in the world's history, and placed the objects of his 
choice most favorably for making use of them in 
reaching others, and if in widening the circle of his 
electing love he gave it the direction most favorable 
to the speediest and most effective evangelization 
of the whole world; then it will appear that holy 
and loving sovereignty has ever presided over the 
process of election, and that at every stage of the 
process we may vindicate the declaration of Scrip- 
ture that he willeth that none should perish but that 
all should live. 

Strategic Men in History. 

All these conditions are met in the call and choice 
of Abraham, in the establishment of his descendants 
in Palestine, the highway of the nations ; in the dis- 
persion of the Jews, who carried the truth abroad 
with them to prepare the way for the gospel ; in the 
call of Paul the apostle to the Gentiles ; in the west- 
ward course of evangelization under Paul toward 
the aggressive and missionary Western races rather 
than toward the passive Orientals; in the lodging 
of modern missionary effort in the hands of the cos- 



88 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



mopolitan people of the West rather than in the 
exclusive races of the East, and in other ways which 
might be indicated if space allowed. Looking at 
human history as a whole, and assuming God's sin- 
cere love for every man, and recognizing the limita- 
tions imposed upon his action by the nature of 
human freedom and sin, we need only two factors 
beyond those ordinarily recognized to show the lov- 
ing as well as the holy character which is behind the 
electing sovereignty in redemption. Those factors 
are the selection of the opportune time in which to 
act, and the choice of strategic men through whom 
grace might flow to the world at large. Abraham 
and Paul and hundreds of others may illustrate the 
principle of choosing strategic men, and the New 
Testament in many ways recognizes the principle 
of the "fulness of times" in God's action. In 
the bowling alley the aim of the bowler is to hit the 
king pin. If this is done at the proper angle he 
knocks down all the other pins. God is the Master 
Bowler in human redemption and chooses men with 
a view to the largest results consistent with the con- 
ditions and limitations under which he must work. 
These have been pointed out and grow chiefly out 
of human freedom and sin. 

Strategic men are not moral men necessarily in 
the first instance, and their choice rather than others 
has no reference to their moral merit. Paul called 
himself the " chief of sinners," and perhaps on this 
very account he was a strategic man— a man through 



THE THEOLOGICAL AXIOM 89 



whom grace might flow to the greatest number. 
Indeed, Paul expressly asserted this. We conclude 
therefore that God's electing love is his effort to 
save the greatest number in the shortest time under 
the conditions imposed by human freedom and the 
necessarily slow processes of moral growth. 

In closing this part of our discussion it should 
be said that the acceptance of our theological axiom 
is not necessarily dependent upon the reader's ac- 
ceptance of the various subordinate points in the 
above very brief outline of an exceedingly difficult 
subject. The essence of the axiom I am sure will 
commend itself to every thoughtful reader, viz., that 
character in God is all we need to vindicate his sov- 
ereignty. Assume that God is holy and that he is 
also loving and the human heart rests in the idea 
of his sovereignty, indeed demands it as the only 
possible ground for security and peace and the 
ultimate triumph of holiness and love among men. 

We may now briefly summarize the foregoing. 

The Key to Sovereignty. 

What is the key to God's sovereignty in creating 
the universe? The key is the garden of Eden, his 
desire to create beings capable of holiness and happi- 
ness. What is the key to the sovereignty of God in 
the incarnation of Christ? Why this, that sover- 
eign omnipotence desired to become sovereign sym- 
pathy and sovereign patience and sovereign suffer- 
ing to redeem. Not the God sitting on the circle 



9° THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



of the heavens contemplating a perishing world is 
the most winsome God, but God in Christ in the 
upper chamber girding himself with a napkin and 
washing disciples' feet. 

What is the key to God's sovereignty in provi- 
dence? Simply this, that his sympathy and patience 
would provide an arena and time for slow pupils to 
achieve character for themselves and society. Hu- 
man society is as yet but a splendid sketch with a 
column here and portico there, a corner-stone yon- 
der. Give it time, says sovereign holiness and sover- 
eign love, and you will see a fair structure. Then 
too, there is that image of the prophet, so repugnant 
to many, which likens God to the potter and man to 
clay. But look at the image. 

The potter has in his mind's eye a beautiful image 
which he would reproduce, and he molds it on the 
wheel which is before him, and if it is yielding and 
plastic the result is as he wishes. But if the clay is 
refractory, the vessel is marred— all of which means 
that God will not do violence to the will of man. His 
sovereignty is holy and it is loving; it respects hu- 
man freedom. And so everywhere. The sovereign 
God is the holy God and the loving God. He will 
reproduce in human life and society the order and 
the beauty, the majesty and power of the material 
heavens, with its glittering constellations and flash- 
ing suns ; he will communicate to men his own bless- 
edness until they reflect in themselves the harmony 
and melody, the might and the glory of the angelic 



THE THEOLOGICAL AXIOM 9 1 



hosts which continually encircle his throne. But he 
will be sovereign; he holds the reigns of power that 
none of the winged horses which draw his mighty 
chariot, though coursing across the sky on flaming 
hoofs, shall become unruly or bring on disaster. 
Even sin will he overrule, so that in a deep, true 
sense it is true, 

That nothing walks with aimless feet, 
That not one life shall be destroyed 
Or cast as rubbish to the void 

When God hath made the pile complete. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM: ALL MEN HAVE AN EQUAL 
RIGHT TO DIRECT ACCESS TO GOD 

There needs to be little said in explanation of the 
terms of our religious axiom. It will scarcely be 
denied by any. It simply asserts the inalienable 
right of every soul to deal with God for itself. It 
implies of course man's capacity to commune with 
God. It assumes the likeness between God and man. 
It is based on the principle of the soul's competency 
in religion. It asserts that on the question of spirit- 
ual privilege there are no such differences in human 
nature as warrant our drawing a line between men 
and claiming for one group in this particular what 
cannot be claimed for others. It denies that there 
are any barriers to any soul to any part of the 
Father's grace. There can therefore be no special 
classes in religion. The spiritual belong to God's 
family. They all have equal access to the Father's 
table, the Father's ear, and the Father's heart. 

Conversely this religious axiom implies and car- 
ries with it the truth that to deprive any soul of the 
privilege of direct access to God is tyranny. For 
one soul to assume the religious privilege or obliga- 
tion of another is a contradiction in terms. Re- 
ligion by its very nature forbids such assumption. 
92 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM 93 



This axiom of course does not forbid the setting 
apart of ministers or officials to perform certain 
specified duties for the sake of convenience or ex- 
pediency in the church. It is only when such of- 
ficials presume to monopolize for themselves the 
privileges or appointments of the Lord's house, or 
when they, through spiritual usurpation, become 
lords over the faith and life of others, that there is 
violation of the axiom. Nor does our axiom stand 
opposed to all those manifold forms of sympathy 
and helpfulness in the religious life from one to 
another among the non-official members of the 
churches. Here again it is only when the one life 
trenches upon the spiritual rights or duties of the 
other that the axiom raises the finger of warning. 

The Principle of Individualism in Religion. 

The axiom, of course, asserts the principle of in- 
dividualism in religion. Primarily the religious 
relation is a relation between God and the individual 
man. Religious privilege and religious duty sub- 
sist between men and God in the first instance in 
their capacity as individuals and only secondarily 
in their social relations. On the social side of their 
religious life there is nothing which can properly 
destroy the freedom of access which all men have to 
God, or in any way mar that fellowship. 

As Christ is the mediator between God and man, 
man's religious life is established and maintained 
through Christ. " No one cometh unto the Father 



94 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



but by me," is Christ's own word on the subject. 
Indeed this point is too clear from all the New Tes- 
tament teachings to require elaboration here. Its 
connection with our religious axiom is clear in this : 
Direct access to God through Christ is the law of 
the Christian life. It is a species of spiritual tyranny 
for men to interpose the church itself, its ordinances, 
or ceremonies, or its formal creeds, between the 
human soul and Christ. This will become increas- 
ingly clear as we proceed. For the present we men- 
tion it as a part of our statement of the contents of 
the religious axiom. Some have erroneously sup- 
posed that Baptists make a saving ordinance of 
baptism. Such a conception is radically at variance 
with our religious axiom and with the whole Bap- 
tist standpoint. 

Since the Reformation this axiom has found ex- 
pression in nothing more than in the exercise of the 
individual's right of private interpretation of the 
Scriptures. It guarantees the right of examining 
God's revelation each man for himself, and of an- 
swering directly to God in belief and conduct. 

New Testament Teachings. 

i. How vital the religious axiom is to the Chris- 
tianity of Christ appears from numerous very strik- 
ing teachings. The soul's direct relation to God 
and God's immediate contact with the soul's life 
appear from the following scriptures. Christ said 
to Peter that on him he would build his church after 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM 95 



the latter had confessed him as the Messiah, and 
Christ had spoken to him the memorable words, 
" Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, 
but the Spirit of my Father in heaven." x Intelli- 
gent personal grasp of truth and inner illumination 
of the Spirit are a part of the structural law of the 
church. Without these the church is not a church. 
It is in the same context that Christ gives to Peter 
the keys of the kingdom and the power of binding 
and loosing. 2 Experimental knowledge of the truth 
as revealed to the heart of the individual directly 
by the Father is the only possible key to the kingdom 

of God. 

In harmony with this is Christ's saying in con- 
nection with his parabolic teachings, " Unto you it 
is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of 
heaven but to them it is not given." 3 Here the re- 
lation of knowledge to spirituality is manifest. 
Ceremonialism in any form apart from knowledge 
is alien to the spirit of the gospel. Quite in keeping 
with this requirement of knowledge is Paul's strik- 
ing statement (i Cor. 2 : 4) that his ministry took 
the form not of sacerdotalism or the administration 
of ceremonies, but that it was a message which he 
delivered and which went to its mark in the hearts 
of men "in demonstration of the Spirit and of 
power." Here again the primacy of the word of 
God as the instrument of the kingdom is entirely 
clear. Spiritual truth addressed to the soul and 

iMatt. 16 : 17. 2 Matt. 16 : 19. s Matt. 13 : «• 



96 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



demonstrated directly to it by the Spirit is of the 
essence of Christianity. Then too, in Hebrews the 
nature of the new covenant is set forth in terms 
which for substance are the same as the passage just 
cited. The law of God is written on the heart. 
" I will put my laws into their mind, and on their 
heart also will I write them . . . and they shall not 
teach every man his fellow citizen, and every man 
his brother, saying, Know ye the Lord; for all 
shall know me from the least to the greatest of 
them." x Here again personal knowledge, derived 
from God himself, and not even from the brethren 
is the characteristic mark of the members of the 
kingdom. And this knowledge is the possession 
of all, from the least unto the greatest. None in 
the kingdom are too young or too ignorant to par- 
take of the knowledge revealed therein. 

Perhaps most suggestive of all is the passage re- 
garding the unpardonable sin. That sin is hardness 
of heart which takes the form of opposition to or 
blasphemy against the Holy Ghost. Refusal to re- 
ceive the " demonstration of the Spirit "—that is, the 
distinctive evidence supplied by the Spirit within 
the soul and in mighty works without— is the un- 
pardonable sin. Such resistance to the Spirit, which 
there is not space to define more fully, indicates that 
the soul has passed the supreme spiritual crisis, 
from which there is no recovery. The sphere in 
which the unpardonable sin takes place is the sphere 

J Heb. 8 : 10, n. 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM 97 



of the inner relations between God's Spirit and 
man's, and the form it assumes is resistance to the 
truth which the Spirit reveals. 

Summary of the Scripture Teachings. 

We may now sum up the contents of the five pas- 
sages as follows: In Christ's words to Peter it is 
clear that the characteristic confession of the king- 
dom is the confession of the Messianic truth ; in the 
next passage the characteristic privilege of the king- 
dom is knowledge of its mysteries ; in the third pas- 
sage the characteristic method and ministry of the 
kingdom is " demonstration " of the truth by the 
Spirit; in the fourth the characteristic description 
of the kingdom is of men on whose hearts the truth 
has been written by the inner demonstration of the 
Spirit. In the final passage the characteristic and 
unpardonable sin of the kingdom is resistance to 
the work of the Spirit who conducts the spiritual 
demonstration within. 

These teachings of Scripture simply give in 
striking form from the New Testament itself the 
essential contents of the religious axiom. They 
disclose to us the peculiar and distinctive quality of 
Christianity as a religion which asserts as inviola- 
ble the direct relation of the soul to God, and the 
universal necessity of truth as the instrument of 
God's intercourse with man. It must follow from 
these facts that certain things are excluded from 
Christianity by virtue of its essential nature. One 

G 



9§ THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



is the assumption on the part of one of the religious 
obligations of another. It is clear that one man can- 
not repent or believe or obey for another. It is 
clear that to attempt thus a vicarious repentance or 
faith or obedience is a contradiction of the elemen- 
tary principles of the Christian religion. No soul 
can on any ground perform these acts for another 
on the one hand, nor on the other can one soul 
perform such acts for another as will exempt the 
other from obligation to perform them for himself. 
The most intimate of all human relationships do 
not avail for this purpose. Family ties are the 
closest. Yet Jesus repeatedly asserted that family 
ties must be broken, if need be, in order to realize 
the ideal of direct dealing with God through him. 
" He that loveth father or mother more than me 
is not worthy of me." 1 " I came not to send peace 
but a sword." 2 " A man's foes shall be they of his 
own household." 3 " My mother and my brethren 
are these which hear the word of God and do it." 4 

The Principle Not Annulled by Covenant 
Relations. 

So vital is this principle of the direct relation of 
the soul to God under Christianity that no covenant 
relations growing out of the theocracy of Israel can 
annul it or affect it. Other things were preparatory 
to it and led up to it. The Old Testament records 

1 Matt. 10 : 37. 2 Matt. 10 : 34. 

3 Matt. 10 : 36. * Matt. 8 : 21. 






THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM 99 

especially in the later prophets give evidence of a 
relaxing of the principle of family solidarity which 
prevailed in the earlier periods. In Ezekiel and 
Isaiah individualism in religion is proclaimed as 
the law of the soul's relation to God and, as we have 
seen, the Epistle to the Hebrews asserts that this 
individualism is the distinct mark of the new as 
contrasted with the old covenant. 

2. The religious axiom, then, is that all souls have 
an equal right to direct access to God. It is now in 
order to trace in outline the violation of the principle 
contained in this axiom in the course of Christian 
history. We shall devote the greater part of the 
present chapter to infant baptism as the most strik- 
ing illustration of a departure from Christianity, 
still prevalent among many evangelical bodies, into 
whose doctrine and practice it came from Roman 
Catholicism, and with many of whose essential prin- 
ciples it is directly at variance. It is in direct con- 
tradiction of the religious axiom. Infant baptism 
really has no logical place in Presbyterianism or 
Methodism, or Congregationalism, if we are to draw 
conclusions from the light of history. Or if these 
bodies insist that it has a logical place in their 
systems, they thereby cast away in principle the 
chief part of their spiritual birthright. My plea in 
this chapter is not merely a polemic against infant 
baptism. It is far more an appeal to evangelical 
denominations, with noble histories behind them, 
to cast out an alien element and conform to their 

UOFC. 



IOO THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

own higher principles and ideals. If the reader will 
not prejudge the case I think this will become clear 
before we have finished. All evangelical bodies 
which practise infant baptism erect in their church 
life a double Christianity, a twofold conception, the 
parts of which are in radical and irrepressible 
conflict. 

The Departure of Early Christianity. 

But first we must glance at the departure of the 
church in the early Christian centuries from the 
principle of our religious axiom. Here we are on 
undisputed ground, as to the historic facts them- 
selves, at least among Protestant historians of all 
names. There is substantial agreement among them, 
with variations in details of course, on all the leading 
facts which follow as to early modifications of New 
Testament Christianity. 

There were four leading forces which had a share 
in the corruption of early Christianity. These were 
paganism as a religious force, Gnosticism, Judaism, 
and Roman imperialism. The resultant corruptions 
or modifications of the New Testament teachings 
may be summed up as episcopacy and sacerdotalism, 
or in terms which are equivalent, as ecclesiastical 
imperialism and sacramentalism. Episcopacy is not 
the same as sacerdotalism. The bishop is for gov- 
ernment, the priest administers sacraments. Of 
course the two overlap and constantly tend to be 
merged, the one in the other. For present purposes 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM IOI 

we confine our attention for the most part to the 
development of the priest and the sacrament. For 
it was here, perhaps more than in episcopacy, in its 
earlier stages, that the religious axiom was obscured 
or ignored. 

The simplicity of baptism and the Lord's Supper, 
the two ordinances instituted by Jesus Christ, was 
only gradually corrupted into the elaborate sacra- 
mentalism of the later Roman Catholicism. The 
facts are substantially as follows : Paganism had 
certain rites and ceremonies which were analogous in 
some respects to baptism and the Lord's Supper. 
With these rites certain mysteries were connected. 
Weak and carnal Christians lately won from pagan- 
ism would naturally bring over some of their 
heathen conceptions with them. These rites and 
their corresponding mysteries would in a measure 
color their views of baptism and the Supper. 
Another idea of paganism, almost ineradicable in- 
deed, was the necessity of the priest and the priest- 
hood in religion. A religion of direct and immediate 
relations between God and man seemed to the pagan 
mind inconceivable. This of course would make 
easy the transition to a sacerdotal Christianity. 
Judaism and Old Testament teachings would lend 
color to the idea of a human priesthood, and its 
ceremonialism would tend to foster corresponding 
practices in the church. All these tendencies would 
combine to obscure the one sufficient sacrifice and 
the sole priesthood of Jesus as the author of salva- 



102 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

tion, and the universal priesthood of believers as the 
subjects of salvation. 

Baptism and Heathen Rites. 

It was but a single step to transfer the idea of 
magical efficacy in the heathen rites over to baptism 
and the Lord's Supper. Accordingly in the second 
and third centuries men began to connect remission 
of sins with baptism. This early view still required 
repentance and faith as conditions of remission, 
although actual remission occurred only at baptism. 
It was the first step toward the conception that 
magical efficacy resides in baptism. Justin Martyr 
in his " First Apology " taught that we are regener- 
ated in baptism. 1 Slowly the view that baptism has 
a magical power gained ground. It was greatly 
aided by the Stoic philosophy of the period es- 
pecially in the hands of Tertullian. The chief ele- 
ment in this philosophy was its idea of substance 
(substantia). The essence of all things is a sub- 
stance. Nothing exists which is not corporeal. 
What is without body is without being. Spirit 
is a kind of body. God is body-substance. Now, it 
is not difficult to see how this philosophy would 
affect the growing tendency to ascribe a magical and 
sacramental efficacy to the material elements of bap- 
tism and the Lord's Supper. Thus arose a philo- 
sophic and apparently rational vindication of the 
sacramental view. 

*A. H. Newman: "History of Anti-pedobaptism," p. 4. 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM IO3 

The doctrine of original sin was made use of to 
the same end. This sin affects infants as well as 
others. Baptism has inherent power. Hence its 
application to infants cleanses them from sin — re- 
generates them. Infant lustrations were practised 
among the heathen, and this would prepare the way 
for infant baptism. Thus generally were the or- 
dinances transformed from symbols into sacraments 
with saving power. Without baptism there was no 
salvation. 

A Great Abuse of Human Power. 

But a priest was needed to impart its sacred char- 
acter to the sacrament and to administer it. Ter- 
tullian is the first who called ministers priests. But 
the idea develops rapidly after him. Cyprian com- 
pleted the conception. The priesthood now becomes 
the depositaries of the mysteries and the grace of 
God. The hierarchy is slowly evolved. The " power 
of the keys " is transferred to an exclusive priest- 
hood. The church consists of the hierarchy. Out- 
side of the church is no salvation. Thus the church, 
the priesthood, and the sacraments are all inter- 
posed between the soul and God. Christianity slowly 
crystallizes under the action of the new principle 
and all its faces and angles are changed. Faith 
passes into a long eclipse. Direct relations to God 
are unknown. Forgiveness now becomes absolu- 
tion; prayer becomes confession to a priest. Re- 
generation takes place in baptism, and baptism 



104 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

is administered in infancy, lest death ensue before 
the sacrament is applied. The whole machinery of 
religion passes over into the hands of a human 
priesthood with its terrible power of spiritual 
tyranny. The sacraments are multiplied from two 
to seven, and each adds a resistless weapon to those 
already possessed by a set of priestly lords of the 
consciences of men. The priestly power culminates 
in the interdict by virtue of which a man of clay, 
like other men, sitting in Rome yonder, can exclude 
whole cities and countries from the grace of God, 
can shut the gates of heaven to millions of fellow- 
mortals and fellow-sinners. The great elemental 
truth that all souls have an equal right to direct ac- 
cess to God passed out of human thought so far as 
the Roman Catholic Church was able to influence 
that thought. If it survived it was confined to 
those in monasteries and among the despised sects 
and was inoperative in Christendom at large. 

The above sketch is of course exceedingly brief 
and necessarily inadequate. But it will serve to indi- 
cate the direction of ecclesiastical development until 
the Reformation. But the Reformation ushered in 
a new era for mankind, which I cannot here dis- 
cuss save in so far as its principles are applicable to 
the subject in hand. 

What Luther found confronting him at the out- 
set of his great movement, therefore, was an ec- 
clesiastical closed system in which the sacraments, 
the priesthood, the hierarchy, the church, and the 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM IO5 

pope, were the central influences and agencies. The 
people were relegated entirely to the background. 
The whole of Christian theology had been econo- 
mized and modified in the interest of the sacramen- 
tal idea. Man is incapable of transacting directly with 
God. Human mediators were essential to the theory 
and the practice of religion. Luther's battle was di- 
rected not merely against evils in the church, nor was 
it, of course, the result simply of a quarrel among 
priests about doctrine. In its deepest and essential 
meaning it was a revolt against spiritual tyranny, 
it was the assertion of the fundamental truth of our 
religious axiom that all souls have an equal right 
to direct access to God. As is well known Luther 
did not at first think of leaving the church of Rome. 
Essentially it was Christ's church but it needed re- 
forming, was his early thought. He was like the 
man who remarked : " If you were to give me a fine 
peach and it was so decayed that it could not be 
eaten, I would not throw it away, I would plant it 
and from the seed I would get a tree that would 
yield me a crop of fine peaches every year." Luther 
thought he would plant the decayed Romish peach 
and obtain a new harvest of fruit. But, alas, he 
soon discovered that the seed itself was bad and 
neither tree nor fruit could come therefrom. 

There are, of course, various ways of stating the 
principles of the Reformation, but they all come 
practically to the same thing. Doctor Schaff, in his 
" History of the Christian Church " sums them up 



106 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

as follows : " There are three fundamental principles 
of the Reformation, the supremacy of the Scrip- 
tures over tradition, the supremacy of faith over 
works, and the supremacy of the Christian people 
over an exclusive priesthood." x These are the ob- 
jective, the subjective, and the social principles of 
the Reformation. Each of these principles accent- 
uates in its own way our religious axiom. The 
objective principle of the authoritative Scriptures 
asserts that every man has a right to read and in- 
terpret the word of God for himself, under the guid- 
ance of the Spirit, untrammeled by human tradition. 
The subjective principle of faith in God and jus- 
tification through Christ restores to the soul its 
spiritual birthright of individual responsibility and 
privilege in direct dealings with God. The social 
principle accents the priesthood of all believers 
against the claims of an exclusive priesthood, which 
means of course that there can be no priestly class 
in the church of God. All are priests alike. This, 
then, was the threefold plea of the Reformers, the 
supremacy of the Scriptures, justification by faith, 
and the priesthood of all believers. In short, Roman- 
ism stood for indirect and the Reformation for direct 
access to God on the part of man. At every point 
this one principle was the kernel of the issue. The 
inner logic of the Protestant movement, its implicit 
law, is this idea of the direct relationship between 
the human soul and God, just as the inner logic and 

1 " History of the Christian Church," Vol. VI, p. 16. 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM IO7 

implicit law of Romanism is the principle of the in- 
direct relations between God and man. 

The Troublesome Question of Infant Baptism. 

We consider next one of the most troublesome 
questions of the Reformation, that which related to 
the baptism of infants. As is well known the Re- 
formers retained the practice, while the Anabaptists 
and other radicals rejected it. No one to-day claims 
any direct and explicit teaching of Scripture for 
infant baptism. It is based by those who practise 
it on inferences and deductions rather than explicit 
teaching on the subject. It is not our purpose here 
to deal with this aspect of the matter. Exegesis has 
won the day in favor of believers' baptism. But it 
will be profitable to examine infant baptism in the 
light of our religious axiom. 

Luther and the other Reformers found infant 
baptism the universal practice in the Roman Church. 
Under the principle of opus operation it was re- 
garded as efficacious in regenerating the soul even in 
the absence of faith. The principle involved in the 
opus operatum was that the sacraments conveyed 
grace always unless mortal sin were interposed as a 
barrier. Infant baptism therefore was a logical and 
consistent custom. Infants do not and cannot have 
faith. But then the sacraments do not require faith. 
This was the Roman Catholic view. It was at this 
point that the Reformers encountered trouble. The 
faith principle was of the essence of the whole Ref- 



108 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

ormation movement. Without it the entire fabric 
fell in ruins like a house of cards. Yet the Ana- 
baptists pointed out that infant baptism had no place 
in New Testament Christianity because there could 
be no faith. Luther retorts in a manner which pro- 
vokes a smile : " How will they prove," said he, 
" that infants do not believe? Because forsooth they 
do not speak and show forth faith. Very well. By 
this reasoning how many hours will we ourselves 
not be Christians, while we sleep and do other 
things ? Cannot God therefore in the same manner 
throughout the whole period of infancy, as in a 
continuous sleep preserve faith in them? " x 

Melancthon had serious misgivings on the sub- 
ject, and Zwingli's clear mind perceived distinctly 
that the Reformers' principle of faith necessarily ex- 
cluded infant baptism and so taught in his earlier 
career. Under pressure of ancient custom, however, 
and for expediency's sake he finally decided to re- 
tain it, and sought to find Scripture warrant for it. 

Thus it was that the Reformers admitted into the 
Reformation an alien principle which led to end- 
less difficulty. The necessity for faith they could 
not deny, and yet infants had no faith. The Roman 
Catholic doctrine of the sacrament that it is opus 
operation, a thing efficacious without faith, they 
could not admit. They retained infant baptism 
nevertheless, and from that day to this have strug- 
gled in vain to naturalize it in Protestantism. The 

1 A. H. Newman: "History of Anti-pedobaptism," p. 72. 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM IOO, 



struggle continues to-day in Europe and America 
with no hope of solution, for the reason that there is 
an irrepressible conflict between the principle of jus- 
tification by faith and infant baptism. One principle 
holds to the direct the other to the indirect access 
of the soul to God, and in all Protestant bodies 
which practise infant baptism the two principles 
exist side by side in a state of unstable equilibrium, 
because they are irreconcilable with each other. 

. Contradictions in the Protestant Systems. 
3. We proceed now to trace briefly this conflict 
in some of the Protestant churches. We begin with 
the Lutheran Church in Germany. In a recent 
volume Professor Liitgert of Halle has given an 
instructive sketch of this controversy inside of the 
Lutheran body. 1 As already indicated Luther re- 
sisted the Catholic doctrine of sacramental efficacy 
without faith. On the other hand he sought to meet 
*he Anabaptists who denied faith in infants, by as- 
serting the objectivity of baptism, i. e., faith does not 
create the baptism but baptism creates faith. God 
through baptism thus communicates faith to the 
infant. Faith of course gives rise to the new birth 
and so in baptism the infant is born again. But the 
matter did not rest here. Gradually the Lutheran 
teachers drifted back into the Catholic view, and 
Hollaz and Baier asserted that grace and faith are 
communicated always where no evil will is raised 

» Wilhelm Liitgert: " Gottes Sohn und Gottes Geist," p. 126 ff. 



IIO THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



in opposition to God, 1 without faith. Slight as this 
variation is from the orthodox Lutheran view 
Chemnitz and others denounced it as a return to 
the Romanist view of the opus operatum. 

The danger of this view was that it made faith 
mere passivity and it became one of the leading 
causes of passive churches. Conversion, the awaken- 
ing of faith, was no longer the task of preaching or 
of Christian nurture. The reaction was inevitable. 
It came in a pietism which sought the conversion of 
men and made this its chief task. 

The Lutheran doctrine was attacked from another 
side by those who yet held to infant baptism. Cal- 
vin asserted that God could give an inner illumina- 
tion to the baptized infant without the preaching 
of the word. Calvin did not assert with Luther that 
infants became believing in baptism, but asserted 
that through a secret energy of the Spirit the seed 
of faith and repentance is planted. Thus arose the 
distinction between the seed of faith and faith itself. 
The Lutherans objected vigorously. The danger 
in Calvin's view is in recognizing through this inner 
illumination a new birth where there is no faith. 
Faith is expressly denied and yet the new birth 
asserted. 

But in the nineteenth century, Lutherans in a 
noteworthy manner attached themselves to Calvin's 
view. W. Hoffman, and Martensen, and Hofling, 
under the pressure of pietism and other influences,' 

1 Liitgert, p. 135. 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM HI 



asserted a view practically identical with that of 
Calvin. Baptism communicates, they said, not the 
new birth itself, but the power of the new birth. 
In the infant this power of the new birth was not in 
consciousness itself, but in the sub-conscious part of 
the soul. It lies there germinally, so to speak, below 
consciousness. But orthodox Lutheranism rejected 
this as subversive of the baptismal teaching which 
asserts that the sacrament is nothing without faith. 
They opposed this later doctrine also as a return to 
the Roman Catholic opus operatum, which denies 
the necessity of faith in order to the efficacy of bap- 
tism. 1 Thus we come to the present time in which 
the orthodox Lutherans assert that neither faith, nor 
repentance, nor the word of God, nor forgiveness 
can be separated from baptism. In the case of in- 
fants the vicarious faith and prayers of the parents 
take the place of the personal faith of the child. 

Lutheran Difficulty Easily Understood. 

Now it is easy to understand this long contro- 
versy among the Lutherans regarding infant^ bap- 
tism. The orthodox doctrine asserts and denies in 
the same breath respecting the same thing. Bap- 
tism without faith is nothing they assert, and at once 
assert that the baptized infant has no faith. By a 
sort of spiritual fiction they assume that a vicarious 
faith in the parents is sufficient. Clear thinking in- 
evitably detects the radical departure in this from 

ltl Gottes Sohn und Gottes Geist" p. 138. 



112 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

the Reformation doctrine of justification by faith 
and the direct relation of every soul to God. In- 
fant baptism is irreconcilable with the Reformation. 
And as we have seen each attempt to modify the 
orthodox Lutheran doctrine led straight back to the 
opus operatum of Roman Catholicism. Lutheran- 
ism then, attempts to maintain a dualistic or two- 
fold principle of salvation directly and radically 
contradictory of each other. Early Lutheranism as- 
serted, as the standards show, that faith was actually 
wrought in infants in baptism while modern Luther- 
anism seems content with asserting only vicarious 
faith in the parents. Intermediate Lutheranism 
dissatisfied with both speaks with Calvin of a seed 
or germ of faith in baptism. But this latter is re- 
jected by the orthodox as Romanism. One party 
rejects the orthodox view as meaningless, and the 
orthodox reject the rival view as Romish. The 
conclusion is that there is no satisfactory explana- 
tion of infant baptism except on Roman Catholic 
grounds, which all evangelicals of course reject as 
subversive of New Testament Christianity. The 
antithesis, sharp and clear, between Romanism and 
the principle of the Reformation comes out nowhere 
more distinctly than in this matter of infant bap- 
tism, and historic Lutheranism furnishes no satis- 
factory method of explaining it or naturalizing it in 
Protestantism. If personal faith is the cardinal 
principle of the Reformation there is no standing 
room for a rite which completely ignores it. To 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM II3 

retain it is to set up a double principle of salvation 
whose parts are gold and clay and incapable of 
fusion or union of any kind. 

We seek in vain among the great religious de- 
nominations which practise infant baptism for any 
more satisfactory vindication of it. In the Church 
of England the High Church party holds a doctrine 
practically identical with that of Romanism. In 
baptism a germ of life is implanted in the soul, 
which may remain undeveloped for a long time, 
but which may in the end be either unfolded 
or destroyed. This of course is also practically 
the same as Calvin's conception of the germ- 
inal regeneration and faith. Bishop H. U. Onder- 
donk of the American Church maintained the 
doctrine of a twofold regeneration, one in bap- 
tism which was a new birth in the sense that it 
changes the state or relation constituting us as sons 
of God; the other without baptism and directly 
through the Holy Spirit giving to us a new moral 
nature, and thus constituting a new birth morally 
and spiritually. This theory of Bishop Onderdonk 
is simply one of the possible logical devices for es- 
caping the evil results of a consistent application of 
the principle of baptismal regeneration. It is a 
very bold assertion of the duplex principle of sal- 
vation implicit in all Protestant doctrinal systems 
which favor infant baptism. The sacramental or 
magical and the moral and spiritual principles ap- 
pear in quite sharp contrast in Onderdonk's theory. 

H 



114 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



The Presbyterian View. 

We note next the Presbyterian view as expounded 
by Dr. A. A. Hodge in his " Outlines of Theology." 
Two things are included in every sacrament, says 
Doctor Hodge : " First, an outward visible sign 
used according to Christ's appointment; second, an 
inward spiritual grace thereby signified." x The 
relation between the sign and the grace signified is 
simply moral, i. e., it is established only by the au- 
thority of Christ; and it is also real, so that when 
properly administered and " received by the recip- 
ient with knowledge and faith they do really, be- 
cause of the promise of Christ, seal the grace signi- 
fied and convey it to the recipient." 2 The grace 
thus conveyed, however, is due not to the sacra- 
ments themselves nor to the administrator, but to 
the Holy Spirit who as a free personal agent uses 
them sovereignly as his instruments. In the case 
of adults grace is conveyed only where there is a 
living faith. 3 

Doctor Hodge expressly adopts a twofold prin- 
ciple in the baptism of adults and infants. For 
adults the prerequisite to baptism is a " credible pro- 
fession of their faith in Jesus as their Saviour." 4 
This is a clear recognition of New Testament in- 
dividualism and of the Reformation doctrine. It 
accords with the religious axiom, that direct access 
to God through faith is the soul's birthright. But 

, P. 590. 2 P. 592. 3 P. 596. *P. 616. 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM 115 

Doctor Hodge at once departs from this principle. 
He asserts that " the family and not the individual 
is the unit embraced in all covenants and dispensa- 
tions," and that everywhere " the free will of the 
parent becomes the destiny of the child." * He 
then postulates a series of principles nowhere war- 
ranted in the New Testament, as that the church 
(of which Christ spoke in the future tense, saying, 
"I will build my church") already existed when 
Christ came; that in the absence of explicit com- 
mand the church that was before continues to be 
the church after Christ; that as the family was the 
unit under Judaism so it is in Christianity; that 
baptism under the new is the same as circumcision 
under the old covenant, a circumcision which, we 
may remark, continued to be practised in the New 
Testament after baptism had been instituted. These 
positions are well known and have been frequently 
answered most successfully. I do not propose to 
go over the same ground here. I mention them to 
indicate how elaborate the logical machinery is to 
justify infant baptism. I remark simply that con- 
sistently carried out it leaves nothing distinctive in 
the new covenant at all. It really converts Chris- 
tianity back again into Judaism. Yet some such 
argument must be devised if infant baptism is to be 
supported; for modern exegesis has settled the 
point that there is no explicit teaching and no New 
Testament instance of the baptism of any others 
*p. 616. 



Il6 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

than believers. Inferences which are contrary to 
a universal usage and fundamental law can scarcely 
serve to justify infant baptism. 

Doctor Hodge, however, insists that faith is 
necessary in the baptism of infants. But it is vi- 
carious faith, a thing unknown to the New Testa- 
ment and destructive of its teachings. The faith of 
parents and the covenant with parents are urged 
by Doctor Hodge in the case of- the baptism of 
infants. 1 The effect produced by baptism upon the 
infant is not very definitely set forth by Doctor 
Hodge. The infant is capable of receiving re- 
generation and " of receiving from the Holy Ghost 
the habit or state of soul of which faith is the 
expression. " He quotes Calvin approvingly : " The 
seed of both repentance and faith lies hid in them 
by the secret operation of the Spirit/' 2 This will 
be recalled by the reader as the teaching of Calvin 
adopted by certain Lutherans and rejected by or- 
thodox Lutherans as Romish, as the anti-Protes- 
tant opus op er at urn, containing the obnoxious doc- 
trine of regeneration without faith. It is not for us 
of course to attempt to reconcile these contradic- 
tions. Our sole purpose here is to show that Pres- 
byterianism, like Lutheranism, and other Protestant 
systems, seeks to maintain a dualistic Christianity, 
a Christianity rent and torn by two irreconcilable 
principles of grace and salvation. 

1 p. 624. 

2 Hodge, p. 624; Calvin's " Institutes," Bk. IV, Chap. XVI, Sec. 20. 



the religious axiom 117 

Doctor Hodge's Inconsistencies. 

The contradictions of Doctor Hodge's position 
appear at numerous points. We indicate a few: 
For one thing he insists upon baptism before and 
baptism after faith ; in infants before, in adults after. 
The New Testament will be searched in vain for sup- 
port of this teaching. He teaches another contradic- 
tory in his doctrine of the need of personal faith in 
adults along with the doctrine of vicarious faith for 
infants. On this also the New Testament is silent. 
Again, he admits infants to one of the ordinances, 
baptism, without faith, and excludes them from the 
other, the Supper, because they are without it. The 
vicarious principle thus operates in the case of the 
one ordinance, but breaks down in the case of the 
other. Doctor Hodge excludes infants from the 
Lord's Supper. There is no logical ground for 
baptizing without personal faith and then excluding 
from the Supper for the lack of it. To support this 
position, however, another contradictory principle 
is introduced, viz., that in baptism the recipient is 
passive while in the Supper he is active. Infants 
cannot be spiritually active, hence the Supper is 
withheld from them. 1 But this even does not ex- 
haust the contradictories in Doctor Hodge's doc- 
trine. For in the same discussion he lays down the 
general principle that the " conditions of admission 
to the Lord's table are identical with those requisite 

l P. 624- 



Il8 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

for baptism." 1 If this be true it is difficult to see 
how infants can be admitted to the one and ex- 
cluded from the other. If a passive state in the 
baptism of adults does not exclude them, why should 
it operate to exclude infants? There is not the 
slightest warrant in the New Testament or in the 
nature of Christianity for the assertion that the re- 
cipient is spiritually passive in baptism and active 
in partaking of the Supper. Faith is active in both 
ordinances. Once more, Doctor Hodge's doctrine 
exhibits the irrepressible conflict in this, that bap- 
tized infants are thus admitted to church-member- 
ship and then excluded from the dearest of church 
privileges, partaking of the Lord's Supper. 

Upon occasion, indeed, Doctor Hodge reasons 
very much like a Baptist. Hear him : " Faith and 
repentance are prerequisites to baptism." " In 
Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything 
nor uncircumcicision, but faith that worketh by love 
. . . but a new creature." " Faith alone is said to 
save, the absence of faith to damn." " The entire 
spirit and method of the gospel is ethical, not magical. 
The great instrument of the Holy Ghost is the truth, 
and all that is ever said of the efficacy of the sacra- 
ments is said of the efficacy of the truth. They are 
means of grace therefore in common with the 
word and as they contain and seal it." 2 This lan- 
guage is fatal to infant baptism as the reader has 
already discerned. A religious rite applied where 

*P. 616. 2 P. 628. 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM 1 19 



faith is not, where the word of truth is not grasped, 
is alien to a religion whose essential nature is thus 
described by Doctor Hodge. But how explain this 
strong language which is so fatal to infant baptism? 
The explanation is that he is there asserting the 
essential nature of Christianity against the Roman 
Catholic doctrine of baptismal regeneration. Thus 
he expresses our religious axiom that all souls have 
an equal right to direct access to God; thus he 
maintains that Christianity is spiritual and personal, 
not magical or sacramental. Infant baptism in its 
Romish or modified forms is radically at variance 
with Christianity. It is alien and not native to the 
Christian soil. It has no logical place in the great 
Reformation movement. Presbyterianism, with its 
great history, will become far greater when it sur- 
renders this alien element and consistently stands 
for the inalienable rights of the human spirit in 
this as it has done in so many other things. 

The Methodist Teaching. 

In the Methodist body also the same contradictory 
views prevail as to baptism. The " Book of Disci- 
pline " enjoins upon pastors that they " exhort all 
parents to dedicate their children to the Lord in 
baptism as early as convenient." x Later, however, 
it becomes clear that they are regarded as members 
of the church after baptism. The baptismal prayer 

i" Doctrines and Discipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
South," p. 92. 



120 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

for the infant is that God will grant to the child 
" now to be baptized with water that which by 
nature he cannot have; that he may be baptized 
with the Holy Ghost; received into Christ's holy 
church, and be made a lively member of the same/' * 
Also the minister prays " that he being saved by 
thy grace, may be received into the ark of Christ's 
church." 2 It thus appears that Methodism also 
adopts a double standard of church-membership, one 
for the non-believing infant through the vicarious 
faith of parents and another for the believing adult. 
It is not surprising, therefore, that Methodists are 
not entirely agreed among themselves as to the 
status of baptized infants. A body of Christian peo- 
ple with as much spirituality and life as the Metho- 
dists possess was sure sooner or later to have mis- 
givings regarding so incongruous a custom as the 
baptism of infants. 

Congregationalists also have had their struggles 
over this apparently insoluble problem of infant 
baptism. In Massachusetts in colonial days the 
baptism of the infant did not entitle it to the exer- 
cise of the franchise as was true of those who were 
church-members in the full sense of the word. The 
" Half-way Covenant " was an expedient adopted by 
them for settling the question whether children of 
parents who had themselves been baptized in in- 
fancy, but who were not discharging their duty as 
church-members, were entitled to the privilege of 

1 " Book of Discipline," p. 235. 2 P. 235. 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM 121 

baptism. The " Covenant " provided that such par- 
ents could transmit to their children the right of 
baptism, with its implicit church-membership by 
covenant. This " Half-way Covenant " was never 
universally indorsed by Congregationalists because 
of its illogical and inconsistent position. In reality 
under the " Half-way Covenant " there were four 
sorts of qualifications for church-membership: One 
for the man who obeyed in baptism for himself upon 
relation of Christian experience; another for par- 
ents who were in good standing in the church and 
for their children, all of whom were baptized in in- 
fancy ; a third for parents not in fellowship with the 
church although baptized in infancy; and a fourth 
for the children of this last class of parents. 

We will next examine briefly a recent volume en- 
titled " Democracy in the Church," which sets forth 
many important considerations in favor of Congre- 
gationalism. The author's utterances regarding 
infant baptism are very frank and he faces the dif- 
ficulties involved without evasion, although he fails 
to satisfy the reader's mind as to the legitimacy of 
that institution in the Christian church. 

A Recent Congregational Writer. 

This Congregational writer grants freely that as 
to the form of baptism, " there has been since the dis- 
covery of the ' Didache ' a quite general agreement 
among competent historians." * " The baptism prac- 

1 E. L. Heermance: "Democracy in The Church," p. 155. 



122 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

tised by the Jews, by Christ's disciples, by the whole 
Christian Church for about thirteen hundred years 
was baptism by immersion." 1 The author is not 
certain but thinks it probable that infant baptism 
was practised in the New Testament church. He 
concludes with Professor Fisher, however, that per- 
haps it is best to say that " the baptism of infants is 
neither explicitly required nor forbidden in the New 
Testament." 2 This, of course, confirms what we 
have already said that modern exegesis has rendered 
its verdict in favor of believer's baptism by immer- 
sion. Our aim in this volume does not include a 
restatement of the entire argument from exegesis. 
It can be found in many books. Our aim is to show 
that infant baptism is alien to the very genius of 
New Testament Christianity and violates its funda- 
mental ideas. 

The author of " Democracy in the Church " says 
that the baptism of children among Congregational- 
ists " is a custom more honored in the breach than in 
the observance. A haze surrounds the whole sub- 
ject as from our past history was perhaps inevita- 
ble." We quite agree with him as to the inevita- 
ble haze which surrounds the subject. He sets out 
to restate the doctrine and theory of infant baptism 
in order to justify it. We condense his views. He 
urges, as usual, the vicarious faith of parents, in- 
sisting on the necessity of faith to the efficacy of 
baptism. In the case of adults personal faith is 

*p. 156. 2 p. 157. 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM 123 

required. 1 But this author departs from the views of 
Bushnell and others on the point of infant church- 
membership. Baptized infants he says are not mem- 
bers of the church until they exercise personal faith. 
Here he expressly joins the Baptists in insisting 
upon the voluntariness of church-membership. 2 He 
distinguishes between the covenant of grace and the 
church covenant. Infant baptism takes place under 
the former, he thinks; voluntary church-member- 
ship under the latter. New Testament warrant for 
this is lacking of course. This writer's instinct for 
the voluntary principle in religion, for the religious 
axiom, leads him to assert that baptism may occur 
twice, in unconscious infancy and when years of dis- 
cretion have been attained. 3 In many ways the 
struggle of the contradictory conceptions of Chris- 
tianity manifests itself in this work with a decided 
tendency to surrender sacramentalism and the in- 
direct for the spiritual, voluntary, and direct ap- 
proach of the soul to God. 

The Early Congregational Struggle. 

In colonial days, as is well known, the Congrega- 
tionalists had a serious and protracted struggle over 
the question of the status of infants in the church. 
Were those baptized in infancy members of the 
church or not? The Congregationalists were di- 
vided on the subject, and neither the " Cambridge 
Platform " nor the " Half-way Covenant " cleared 

*Pp. 159, 163. b p. 166. 3 P. 168. 



124 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

the matter up in any satisfactory manner. There is 
no possible mode of conceiving or defining the 
church which shall include infants and adults with- 
out introducing fundamentally contradictory views. 
A church thus inclusive of both would embrace in 
its membership conscious and unconscious members ; 
believing and unbelieving; those who came by vi- 
carious and those who enter by personal faith ; those 
who come to Christ directly and those who come in- 
directly ; those who are spiritually passive and those 
who are spiritually active; those entitled to com- 
mune and those who, without personal sinful acts, 
are disqualified for communion. To adopt the view 
of the author of " Democracy in the Church " in- 
volves a double Christianity at every point when bap- 
tism is in question. Baptism in order to church- 
membership for believing adults, baptism without 
church-membership for unbelieving infants; bap- 
tism without faith and baptism with faith; and in 
some cases two baptisms, the first without, the 
second with faith. 

We must bring this long chapter to a close. We 
have made good our plea. Infant baptism has no 
place in New Testament Christianity and no logical 
place in the churches of Protestantism. In such 
churches it involves the presence of contradictory 
and radically inconsistent views of religion, one a 
spiritual fiction the other a spiritual reality. It 
makes current in the religious world spiritual coins 
of co-ordinate value bearing the same stamp and 



THE RELIGIOUS AXIOM 125 



passing for the same ends, one of which is pure gold 
and the other an alloy which under any just stand- 
ard of spiritual values would have to be rejected as 
counterfeit. Such contradictories in religion inevi- 
tably lead to one of two results : The base and the 
genuine metal come to be regarded as equivalent to 
each other ; or they both become equivocal in mean- 
ing and value. The rule is for the higher value to 
become obscured or set aside and the lower to flood 
the market, as in the commercial world. Of one 
thing we may be sure, whatever may be true in the 
fiscal world, the kingdom of God cannot perma- 
nently endure a spiritual bimetallism. 

The plea that infant baptism is necessary to 
Christian nurture assumes falsely that any real 
element of parental duty or Christian nurture is 
impossible without it. Every parental duty in the 
matter of religious teaching and training is possible 
without the use of a rite which anticipates and fore- 
stalls personal action, robs the child of the joy of 
conscious obedience to Christ in his own appointed 
ordinance ; in short which does despite and violence 
to individuality and personality, the choicest gift of 
God to our children, and that which we should 
above all things protect and conserve. No one can 
join the church for another; no one can perform 
any act of personal religious duty for another; no 
one can without usurpation choose for another m 
religion. If the principle of vicarious faith and 
obedience is valid in the case of infant baptism 



126 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



there is no reason why it may not be applied in every 
part of the Christian life. Heredity and Christian 
nurture are one thing. They are the law of God 
for man. But neither heredity nor Christian nur- 
ture admits vicarious choices in religion. Even 
God's elective decree never executes itself in the 
soul apart from a persuaded will which chooses for 
itself so far as we have explicit teaching on the sub- 
ject. Yet parents and sponsors elect and decree and 
perform for their children in the matter of infant 
baptism, where there is no slightest response of the 
will, and thus do despite unto God's grace as re- 
vealed in Christ and contaminate the fountainhead 
of Christian truth. 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM : ALL BELIEVERS HAVE A 
RIGHT TO EQUAL PRIVILEGES IN THE CHURCH 

i. A few words in explanation of the terms of this 
axiom will be sufficient. Equality of privilege in the 
church of course has no reference to the mental and 
spiritual capacities of men. No one regards all 
men as possessing equal natural ability or learn- 
ing. Nor does the axiom assume that one man is as 
well fitted as another for official position in the 
church. Diversities of gifts and offices and ad- 
ministrations are clearly recognized in the New 
Testament churches and as clearly set forth for 
our guidance. 
The Ecclesiastical and Religious Axioms. 

The ecclesiastical is best explained by the religious 
axiom. It is because men have an equal right to 
direct access to God that they are entitled to equal 
privileges in the church. Equality before God makes 
men equal in their ecclesiastical standing. The 
church is a brotherhood because it is a family of 
which God is the father and in which Jesus Christ 
is the elder brother. There is, with respect to the 
members of the church, no law of ecclesiastical pri- 
mogeniture by which favored sons receive special 

127 



128 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

and disproportionate parts of the Father's inherit- 
ance, and no law of hereditary lordship by which 
spiritual dynasties are established through imposi- 
tion of hands or otherwise. The methods of the 
church are those of a spiritual brotherhood of equals. 
Personal adjustment of offenses, not judicial de- 
cisions, is Christ's preferred way in all private griev- 
ances and nowhere does he establish a court other 
than the local congregation. Apostles even, who 
were especially inspired for their tasks, exerted 
their authority not as lords of the conscience but 
as brothers. 

The nature of Christ's church is determined by 
the twofold relationship of the believer, one to 
Christ himself, the other to the brethren. Christ is 
Lord. The believer in Christ belongs to an absolute 
monarchy, the most absolute indeed the world ever 
knew. But the monarch is in heaven and relates 
himself to his subjects through his revealed word 
and through his Spirit. The subject has fellowship 
directly with the monarch. All his dealings with 
his subjects are individual. He delegates his au- 
thority to none. But the first and finest expression 
of Christ's lordship over the individual believer is 
in the gift of autonomy to him. Christ discovers 
each man to himself and starts him on an autono- 
mous career, but never for a moment does he relax 
his grasp upon that man's conscience or life. Yet 
nothing thrills men into such a sense of freedom 
and power. 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM 129 

The above is a paradox : The lordship of Christ 
and the autonomy of the soul. Against such a soul 
there is no law, as Paul declares. It incarnates the 
law of Christ. But the paradox of the individual 
and Christ involves a paradox of the spiritual society 
and Christ. Because the individual deals directly 
with his Lord and is immediately responsible to him, 
the spiritual society must needs be a democracy. 
That is, the church is a community of autonomous 
individuals under the immediate lordship of Christ 
held together by a social bond of common interest, 
due to a common faith and inspired by common 
tasks and ends, all of which are assigned to him by 
the common Lord. The church, therefore, is the 
expression of the paradoxical conception of the 
union of absolute monarchy and pure democracy. 
This we might say is the formula of the church. 
Every form of polity other than democracy some- 
where infringes upon the lordship of Christ. I 
mean direct lordship. There is no indirect lordship 
known to the New Testament. An ecclesiastical 
monarchy with a human head, like the Roman 
Catholic Church, radically alters the very nature of 
Christianity. Baptist Congregationalism is the exact 
antithesis of the Romish hierarchy. Modified 
ecclesiastical monarchies, or aristocracies, or oli- 
garchies, are less objectionable but they too violate 
one or the other of the organic laws of the church, 
the direct lordship of Christ, or the equality of all 
believers in spiritual privilege. 



i30 the axioms of religion 

The Human Body and the Church. 

The favorite New Testament figure to set forth 
Christ's relations to the church is that of the human 
body of which Christ is the head. The church- 
members are the members of the body of Christ. 
Repeatedly this image is employed, especially by 
Paul. The blood flows directly from head to mem- 
bers. The will issues its mandates directly to the 
members of the body, and they respond. Church- 
members are members one of another and also of 
Christ. Thus in the figure of the body we have a 
striking exposition of the twofold relationship of 
the believer which determines the nature of the 
church, viz. : A direct relation to the head and a 
relation of equality to other members of the body. 

Now, it is because of this twofold relationship, 
this union of absolute monarchy and pure de- 
mocracy in the church, that analogies to human 
government cannot hold in fixing a church polity. 
No such relationships exist in human government. 
All, or nearly all, human governments are indirect. 

The town meeting is an example of pure de- 
mocracy, but in extending human government over 
large areas the central authority must be localized. 
It cannot act everywhere and immediately upon 
its citizens or subjects. Moreover, legislation on 
matters of general interest must be through dele- 
gated powers, for the reason that the total citizen- 
ship cannot assemble, unite, and deliberate for this 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM I3I 

purpose. Centralized authority is also necessary 
in the State for the exercise of force, a function 
always improper for the Church. On the contrary 
the central authority in Christianity cannot be local- 
ized. Christ said it was expedient that he go away 
in order that the Holy Spirit might come. Thus 
he " exchanged his presence for his omnipresence." 
It might be a logical procedure for a given com- 
munity owning a large body of real estate in com- 
mon to delegate the control of its mines and the 
distribution of the coal to a commission. The 
nature of the case would require some such admin- 
istration perhaps. But it would be absurd to ap- 
point a commission to control and distribute the 
sunlight. In this respect the inhabitants would only 
need to keep out of each other's light. Every man 
would simply have to avoid building his house or 
ordering his life so as to obscure the sun from his 
brother. As the Baptist sees it, papacies and episco- 
pacies are commissions to control the sunshine. 

Legislation not Needed in the Church. 

We may now add that legislation is not needed. 
The Scriptures are the rule of faith and practice 
and the omnipresent Spirit the interpreter. Repub- 
licanism, therefore, or representative government, 
or indirect democracy, cannot take the place of 
the pure democracy and the absolute monarchy of 
the New Testament church. 

We conclude therefore that pure democracy in 



132 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

church polity is the only institutional expression — 
the only expression in the form of church organiza- 
tion — of our two axioms, the religious, or the soul's 
right to direct dealing with God, and the ecclesi- 
astical, or the equality of believers in spiritual privi- 
lege in the church. It thus appears that the ques- 
tion of church polity is more than a question of a 
few detached proof-texts from the New Testament. 
The question of the constitution of the church enters 
vitally into the question of the constitution of the 
kingdom of God. 

2. Our position will become even more abundantly 
clear if we now institute a contrast between the 
two methods by which church polities have been de- 
veloped, or the laws by which their forms have been 
determined. These we will call on the one hand the 
spiritual and on the other the temporal. This con- 
trast will exhibit to us the very suggestive fact that 
two environments have operated upon the churches 
in ecclesiastical history, and that each environment 
operates in a way of its own and with results 
corresponding. 

The first line of development is the spiritual. 
This we find in the New Testament. Baptists some- 
times define a church as " a voluntary association 
of believers united together for the purpose of 
worship and edification. ,, Dr. A. J. Gordon has 
criticized this definition. " It is no more true," 
he says, "than that hands and feet and eyes and 
ears are voluntarily united in the human body for the 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM I33 

purposes of locomotion and work." Doctor Gor- 
don's emphasis is upon the sovereign agency of the 
Holy Spirit in creating the church. 1 

Now as a matter of fact both the definition and 
Doctor Gordon's criticism are correct and valid, be- 
cause each supplies a needed element. The volun- 
tary principle enters essentially into the constitution 
of a church. But prior to human choice in the 
matter was the initiative of the Holy Spirit. The 
spiritual environment from above acted upon men. 
They were regenerated. Their renewed spiritual 
natures then impelled them to associate themselves 
together as a church. The religious and ecclesiastical 
axioms both came into play ; a direct relation to God 
first, then a voluntary association on terms of 
equality. 

Church Organization from Within. 

This was precisely the way in which the New 
Testament churches arose. First came Christ's call 
and the response of the individual. Then came a 
group of individuals attached to his person. When 
the Spirit came at Pentecost after Christ's departure 
to the Father the process indicated in Doctor Gor- 
don's criticism of the current definition of a church 
began, under the leadership of the Holy Spirit. 
Individuals were drawn together. The indwelling 
Spirit began to organize the membership of Christ's 
body into his church. 

1 A. J. Gordon: "The Ministry of the Spirit," pp. 53, 54. 



134 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

I am not here concerned to cite the texts which 
prove that the New Testament churches were de- 
mocracies. It may be fairly claimed by the advo- 
cates of a congregational polity that scholarship 
has decided in their favor. There was neither 
priest nor bishop in the medieval and modern sense 
of the word in the New Testament churches. These 
were pure democracies. But what I am concerned 
in particular to show is that democracy alone ac- 
cords with the nature of the kingdom of God; that 
the direct relations of men to God and their equality 
as brethren require a democratic church polity. No 
other polity leaves the soul free. 

This last statement is susceptible of historical 
proof. Whenever men are acted upon directly by 
the spiritual environment they tend to the free and 
self-governing congregation, and when untram- 
meled by external bonds they always adopt it. The 
reader will recall the many sects of Christian history 
whose offense was the freedom of the Spirit. The 
Donatists were suppressed in the early centuries 
because they insisted upon prophesying. This meant 
that they asserted their direct relation to Christ 
through the Spirit as against the indirect relation 
through the priesthood. So with many other sects 
which the Roman Church sought to suppress. 

Monasticism illustrates the same principle. At 
its outset monasticism was the revolt of the soul 
against the tyranny of external authority and an 
effort to come into direct relations with God. 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM 1 35 

Readers of church history will recall at once the 
struggle between the bishops and the monasteries. 
The latter were little self-governing communities 
which were intensely jealous of their spiritual free- 
dom, and for a long time they maintained that free- 
dom within the limits of a general subordination to 
the pope at Rome. This was not ideal but it illus- 
trates the truth we maintain that democracy is the 
law of church organization whenever and wherever 
the soul enjoys its spiritual right of direct access to 
God. The effort of the Romish hierarchy to sup- 
press this spontaneous and beautiful life of the 
Spirit, by imposing its iron authority instead, was 
very unwise. It was the church authorities laying 
waste their own vineyard. It reminds us of the 
ignorant Indian soldier who found a leathern pouch 
containing pearls. Not knowing the value of pearls 
he threw these away but kept the pouch as a con- 
venient receptacle for his tobacco. 

Puritanism Perpetuates Monasticism. 

Puritanism in England was, according to Prof. 
A. V. G. Allen, the continuance of monasticism in 
its essential principle. Professor Allen maintains 
that the various Nonconformist churches in Eng- 
land to-day are modern equivalents of monasticism 
in the Middle Ages, in that they stand for individ- 
ualism, for soul freedom, for the spiritual and 
direct relation of the soul to God as against the 
ecclesiastical lordship of the Established Church. 



I36 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



Another interesting illustration of the same law of 
ecclesiastical democracy in response to spiritual im- 
pulse and environment is seen in the rise of Baptist 
churches where men have only the New Testament 
for guidance. A striking instance was that of 
Oncken and his friends in 1834 in Hamburg, Ger- 
many. Coming into the new life in Christ they 
were without ecclesiastical guides. They shut them- 
selves up to a study of the New Testament. A 
Baptist church resulted and to this single congrega- 
tion the Baptists of Germany in large part trace 
their origin. Baron Uixkull of Russia, who has re- 
cently visited America in the interest of the Russian 
Baptists relates a similar story of the origin of the 
Baptists within the Czar's dominions. Lutheran 
missionaries came and preached and left Bibles and 
then departed. With no guide but the Holy Spirit 
and the New Testament the flourishing Baptist 
movement began in Russia. The Baptists of Russia 
now number many thousands and are growing rap- 
idly. Other instances of the same principle are 
numerous in modern Baptist history. In Mexico 
and Brazil and elsewhere Baptist churches have 
sprung spontaneously into being, so to speak, as a 
result of the simple study of the New Testament 
under the sole tutelage of the Holy Spirit. 

Church Organization from Without. 

If now we look at the various modifications of 
church polity throughout Christian history we find 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM I37 

that another environment and another group of 
forces were at work. Thus modifications through 
the temporal as contrasted with the spiritual envi- 
ronment took place. We can of course only look at 
this development within present limits in a most 
general way. Yet this will suffice to make clear the 
point. 

The preeminence of the Roman See came about 
as a result of the operation of many forces. Geo- 
graphical location at the world's capital was no small 
factor. The tradition of a visit by the Apostle 
Peter to Rome assisted. The need for a central and 
powerful machinery for the suppression of heresy 
co-operated. When the empire was destroyed the 
need for a strong temporal head offered the bishop 
of Rome an opportunity. We have already in a 
previous chapter pointed out how the sacerdotal 
and sacramental idea arose in large part from 
heathenism. The factors were nearly all temporal. 
It is easily seen that they reversed the principle of 
church organization. That principle was no longer 
inward, the Spirit forming for itself a body in ac- 
cordance with its nature, but outward. The tem- 
poral and political environment imposed its laws 
upon a spiritual body. Thus the church ceased to 
be an organism and became a mechanism. It was 
a contrivance for achieving temporal ends rather 
than a spiritual body adapted to the ends of a life- 
giving Spirit. Hitherto the church had been a tree 
of life, full of sap and power and yielding abundant 



I38 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

fruit for mankind. Now the tree was cut down and 
fashioned into a battering ram for warlike purposes. 
Battering rams are useful in their time and for the 
purposes for which they are built, but they have no 
roots and bear no fruit. 

The Reformation did not cure this evil. Both 
Calvin and Luther resorted to the temporal environ- 
ment for aid in the creation of the new churches. 
Calvin's community became a theocracy. Luther 
turned over the government of the church to the 
temporal power, and this in turn placed it in the 
hands, not of a hierarchy indeed, but of a consistory 
made up from the clergy. Luther admitted that 
the real church and real authority is the local con- 
gregation. Indeed the seventh article of the Augs- 
burg Confession defines the church thus. But 
Luther said in his characteristic fashion that the 
" wild Germans " were not yet ready for Congre- 
gationalism. 

In England the king had always been prominent 
in church affairs from the earliest days. Even 
Wycliffe championed the prerogative of the king 
in the church. This helps to explain the tenacity 
with which English thinkers have prosecuted the 
attempt to justify a religious establishment on 
theoretical grounds. Hooker's was one of the most 
forcible and impressive of these efforts. It asserted 
that Church and State were one society. There 
follows a long list of theorists and theories, includ- 
ing Coleridge, Chalmers of Scotland, Gladstone, 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM 1 39 

Macaulay, and others. These need not be dwelt 
upon here further than to indicate how church polity 
was being determined not on grounds deduced from 
its own nature, but on those drawn from the tem- 
poral environment. 

Opportunism in Control. 

There was indeed a sort of opportunism which 
seemed to control in the formation of the many 
polities which took their rise after the Reformation. 
The point of view and the exigencies of the hour 
nearly always determined which side of the scales 
would go down. Romanism even in the earlier ages 
asserted the Church's independence of the State when 
it was in danger of becoming subject to the temporal 
power. It reversed this position when under Hilde- 
brand and his successors the Church gained the 
ascendency over the State. In the sixteenth century 
the Jesuits taught that in the State the power all be- 
longed originally to the people; thus, as Doctor 
Fisher remarks, anticipating the democratic ideas of 
Rousseau and Jefferson. Their aim was to weaken 
the power of the king. They still held to an opposite 
theory as to the church, that is, the spiritual des- 
potism of the pope. 

In England in the sixteenth century the Anglicans 
denied and the Puritans affirmed the divine origin 
of church polity. In the seventeenth century the 
positions were reversed, the Anglicans affirming 
and the Puritans tending more and more to deny 



I40 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

New Testament warrant for a fixed polity. 1 Presby- 
terians and Congregationalists in America to-day are 
firm believers in separation of Church and State. 
But it is well known that in the Massachusetts Bay 
Colony a theocracy was set up in which civic privi- 
leges were limited to church-members. The history 
of Presbyterianism in England and Scotland makes 
it clear that originally in this body there was no 
inherent principle forbidding a union of Church 
and State. Chalmers, indeed, formally promulgated 
the view that the State should adopt and maintain 
some one form of Christianity. Methodism in like 
manner in its earlier history was identified with the 
fortunes of the Church of England and in the 
struggle for religious freedom in Virginia cast the 
weight of its influence in the scale with the estab- 
lished church. 

Lessons from the Past. 

The above sketch is not given merely to recall 
outgrown conceptions of the church, nor to question 
the wisdom and greatness of the men who founded 
the great denominations referred to; nor am I 
blind to the difficulties they had to encounter. I 
rejoice in their mighty influence for good and in 
the power of those forms of organized Christianity 
which they have left. It is proper, however, to 
gather gems of wisdom amid the ruins of the past, 
and to observe what flowers of truth blossom by 

1 A. V. G. Allen: " Christian Institutions," p. 13. 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM I4I 

the wayside of a pathway untraveled by pilgrims of 
to-day. It is entirely clear from the foregoing that 
in a very large part of modern Christendom the 
polities which survive are the result of the operation 
in very large measure of the temporal rather than 
the spiritual environment upon the church life and 
growth. The spiritual method may be likened to 
the action of a flame which played upon the material 
until its nature was changed and it was shaped into 
a new unity. The temporal was like the action of a 
mold which received the material unchanged and 
impressed upon it externally its own form. 

I shall probably be met at this point by an objec- 
tion. Some one may say, " You ignore the principle 
of development in Christianity; you are right in 
asserting that the earliest form of Christianity was 
democratic, but you forget that the pure democracies 
of the New Testament were necessarily subject to 
modification by changing circumstances. You must 
allow room for church organization to take the form 
demanded by changing conditions from age to age." 
To which we reply: There is no evidence of any 
such principle of development in the New Testament 
itself. The objection is based upon an inference not 
from the principles of the New Testament but from 
the course of events. 

The Test of Development. 

It is not difficult, however, to test any theory 
of development. Ecclesiastical development is per- 



142 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

missible within the limits of the religious and ecclesi- 
astical axioms. So soon as development carries the 
church beyond the boundaries of free and direct 
intercourse with God — beyond the limits of equality 
and brotherhood — it becomes subversive of the fun- 
damental principles of the kingdom of God. This 
comes to light in a striking manner in J. H. New- 
man's theory of development, outlined in a previous 
chapter. Newman's quest was for a religious 
authority. He rejected conscience which might 
serve a natural but not a revealed religion ; he re- 
jected the Church of England as having no unity of 
expression and no central organ of authority. He 
rejected the Scriptures because they required an 
interpreter. He found his authority in the Roman 
Catholic Church with its authoritative head in Rome. 
He became a Catholic. His doctrine of develop- 
ment was the logical attempt to vindicate his action. 
Of course all Protestants reject the papacy as the 
vicegerent of Christ. They look to Christ himself 
as the supreme authority in religion. 

Now every doctrine of development which passes 
beyond democracy and autonomy in the church re- 
peats Newman's mistake in greater or less degree, 
because it localizes authority somewhere outside of 
Christ. It may be in a bench of bishops or in a 
synod or general assembly, but in any case it makes 
the soul responsible to Christ through other men 
and not directly. It cuts off the direct access of men 
to God in all matters delegated to a human authority. 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM I43 

We remark further that the " developed " polities 
which incorporate in any degree the principle of 
authority of the indirect kind are all needless in the 
Christian programme. There is no room for human 
legislation of the authoritative kind in Christianity. 
What about creed-making? Creeds are useful as 
interpretations of Scripture at any particular period 
but so soon as they become binding they become 
divisive. The Scriptures are the guide of the church 
under Christ's Spirit. Laws of any kind — those 
which affect the faith or the life — inevitably lead 
to mischief in the church. The reason is that they 
introduce a double principle of authority — that of 
Christ and that of ecclesiastical superiors. 

Judicial Functions and the Local 
Congregation. 

There is likewise no place for any judicial func- 
tions apart from the local congregation. In the local 
congregation it is not so much a legal and judicial 
procedure as it is a life process, the healthy organ- 
ism sloughing off unsound parts. All high ecclesias- 
tical courts for the trial of heretics bring scandal 
and confusion and schism to the church of Christ. 
In fact the only aspect of the organization of Chris- 
tianity which requires or admits development is the 
administrative. In this particular New Testament 
Christianity is susceptible of indefinite development, 
without doing any violence to the Christian principle 
of authority. 



144 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

3. The question may be asked whether democracy 
as the form of church polity would have been ade- 
quate to the task of the past centuries, whether it 
could have preserved Christianity in the long night 
of the Dark Ages. Usually a negative answer is 
given. The question is, of course, in large part 
speculative and no certain conclusion is possible. 
But something may be said. If infant baptism and 
sacramentalism had been kept out of the church and 
the doctrine of a regenerate membership maintained 
steadfastly, the occasion for centralized ecclesiastical 
authority need not have arisen. If the gipsy moth 
had never been brought across the sea and intro- 
duced into New England, the authorities of Massa- 
chusetts would not have been called upon to organ- 
ize a campaign for the protection of the trees. 
When the tide of the unregenerated began to flow 
into the church through infant baptism, the gipsy 
moth of medieval Christianity, then the secular ideal 
and method became necessary for government. The 
papacy was the result. Of course the direct spiritual 
authority of Christ could not be exerted over men 
whose loyalty to his religion was merely external 
and formal. Loring Brace, as we shall see in a later 
chapter, has declared that the most unfortunate 
thing for early Christianity was the loss of the 
simple democratic polity of the New Testament. 
For when this occurred and religion took the form 
of an establishment supported by the State, Christi- 
anity ceased to be a leaven of spirituality and right- 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM 145 

eousness permeating society everywhere, and became 
instead a political force operating after the manner 
and with the ends of such a force. In fact we may 
say that from Constantine onward the destiny of 
Christianity was guided by a new law. The State 
and Church like Diomed and Glaucus in the oppos- 
ing armies of Homer's story, had exchanged 
weapons. The State henceforth would seek to wield 
the spiritual power and the Church the temporal. 
But alas, as in the exchange of weapons on the 
Trojan battlefield, for brass arms of mean device 
the church gave her own "of gold divinely 
wrought." 

Democratic Polity Successful. 

As a matter of fact the democratic polity has 
always worked successfully when fairly tried, among 
barbarians or civilized men. It is working well to- 
day in many mission fields. It is peculiarly the 
polity of the intelligent and the spiritual, it is true. 
But then its fundamental assumption, as Baptists 
hold it, is that every member of each congregation 
is a regenerated man. We do not realize our ideal 
of course, but our doctrine and practice are a bul- 
wark of protection against evils from without. 
Luther's objection to Congregationalism for the 
Germans was that they were " wild " and " tur- 
bulent." But Baptists assume at least, and seek to 
embody the assumption in church life, that church- 
members have been " tamed " by the Spirit of God. 

K 



I46 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

Certainly the congregational polity was quite suited 
to the New Testament age and ere long the beacon 
fires of a new hope for mankind were kindled all 
around the shores of the Mediterranean. Spiritual 
power waned as these democracies were left behind 
and Christianity went forth into the wilderness of 
the Dark Ages to meet the giant of sin, not with the 
spiritual weapons of the earlier days, which under 
God had conquered the Roman power, but with 
the carnal weapons which she had wrested from the 
hands of her conquered foe. 

4. It will be in order now to look for a moment at 
the equipment of democracy for its spiritual tasks. 
It can be maintained that as Baptists hold it this 
form of polity is eminently fitted for the work 
which Christianity is to perform in the world. This 
is by no means to overlook the fact that centralized 
polities possess certain advantages for doing some 
things. But where there is gain in one respect there 
is loss in another. 

Be it said at once then that Baptists have no 
creed-making or other legislative power. They hold 
that all men are directly answerable to Christ, and 
that the Scriptures are a sufficient revelation of 
his will. Neither have they any courts to try here- 
tics. They believe the local church, with the help 
of a council of wise advisers, can attend to all 
judicial matters. As a result they have never lost 
any time or energy over the question of creed re- 
vision. Their general bodies do not require weeks 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM I47 

to transact the Lord's business chiefly because they 
are unencumbered by complicated systems of legis- 
lative and judicial machinery. Baptists sometimes 
express surprise that their general conventions are 
not more widely exploited in the secular press. A 
reporter recently gave the true answer. " The 
reason is," he said, " you Baptists have no church 
politics in your conventions. " 

Baptists and Organization. 

Baptists, however, can and do organize their 
forces efficiently. We have the district Associa- 
tions or voluntary assemblies of messengers from 
local churches covering a limited district. We have 
our State Conventions which include messengers 
from all parts of the State, and our general conven- 
tions among English and Continental and other 
Baptists. Our organization, therefore, in its ampli- 
tude and geographical extent is equal to that, say, 
of our Presbyterian brethren, but without imitating 
them in the introduction of the principle of indirect 
authority. None of these bodies is legislative or 
judicial. Christ is the sole authority in all. They 
are for advisory and administrative purposes. 

Then too, our superintendents and secretaries of 
missions perform the work of bishops without any 
of the authority of bishops. They visit the fields 
and lend a helping hand by means of suggestion, 
and in other ways. But they have no semblance 
of authority over any congregation however small. 



I48 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

We have also a great variety of Boards and 
councils. Congregationalism is capable of great 
diversity in this respect These are not rigid in 
form that they may not be changed when occasion 
arises. Thus there is all needful flexibility. 

We must of course frankly recognize our short- 
comings. There is often an over-emphasis of indi- 
vidualism. Demagogues have occasionally taken 
the place of wise leaders over limited areas and for 
a brief period. Questions of administration have 
sometimes led to temporary schism and unwhole- 
some controversy. But as there is no legal solidarity 
of the denomination, so also there is no way to split 
it into two or more parts on general questions. 
When divided we remain in a state of unstable equi- 
librium and can reunite at any time. There is no 
chemical law operative among us which leads to 
crystallization of separated parts on permanently 
antagonistic lines. If a local church becomes 
worldly and dies spiritually it may also pass out of 
existence as a visible organization. It cannot re- 
main as a burden to its sister churches. It is simply 
insulated from the rest by its own worldliness. The 
spiritual churches, however, may unite in their 
Associations and Conventions for mutual helpful- 
ness. 

An Evil to be Corrected. 

There is another really great evil which may be 
but which has not yet been corrected. Members 



THE ECCLESIASTICAL AXIOM 149 

leaving one church frequently refuse to put their 
letters in the church of the community in which they 
live. Our pastors are sometimes to blame here. 
They encourage their members too often not to 
call for church letters. " Parochial selfishness " is 
the name which has been given to this tendency. 
Baptists ought to correct it. 

The freedom and autonomy of Baptist churches 
give rise to another fact which is evil in one aspect 
and good in another. As unity among us is volun- 
tary and not enforced it sometimes comes slowly. 
Intelligence and spirituality, or common sense and 
the grace of God, are the only unifying forces at 
our command. Sometimes, therefore, there are two 
or three or four denominational papers where there 
should be but one. The same is true of denomina- 
tional schools and once in a long while of Associa- 
tions and Conventions. This, however, while it is 
an element of weakness has its good side. It is our 
way of carrying out the principle of live and let 
live. Time, however, nearly always corrects the 
divisive tendencies for the reason that there are no 
permanent barriers to unity which any one can 
erect, and slowly common sense and duty assert 
themselves. It is a prime merit of our polity that 
conscience and judgment can never be permanently 
ruled out of court. In centralized polities the hands 
of common sense are sometimes bound by the red 
tape or chartered powers of institutionalism, while 
the voice of conscience is stifled by authority. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE MORAL AXIOM : TO BE RESPONSIBLE THE SOUL 
MUST BE FREE 

This axiom scarcely needs comment of any kind 
so far as its terms and general meaning are con- 
cerned. It is the basis of all ethics. No system of 
morals or of theology attempts now to repudiate 
or even to question it. As we have seen, God's 
sovereignty respects it. No gardener with a passion- 
ate love for growing things ever dealt so gently and 
skilfully with a delicate vine in training it to climb 
its trellis as God deals with the human will. We 
should imitate God in this. The gospel message is 
never forced upon the will. Indeed the will cannot 
be " forced." The ideas of the will and of force 
are incompatible and incommensurable. 

The appeal of the moral axiom is to our self- 
consciousness. This is what gave it power when 
the theologians after the Reformation urged it 
against the extreme Calvinism of the day. Men 
knew they were free, and therefore no theory of 
God's decrees which ignored this fact could per- 
manently hold its place in the doctrinal system. The 
reaction went too far, but it was wholesome and 
necessary. 

It is our own consciousness of freedom which 
150 



THE MORAL AXIOM 151 

fortifies us against the modern doctrine of heredity. 
On one side, of course, heredity contains a great 
and profoundly significant truth. But man's moral 
sense will here stubbornly guard the citadel of 
freedom. The soul may not be able to defend its 
freedom in a speculative or metaphysical way. But 
it shuts itself in its castle, closes the drawbridge and 
every other avenue of entrance, and defies the foe. 
It knows there is something wrong with any meta- 
physics which denies freedom, and if metaphysics 
cannot overcome the difficulty it is merely bad for 
metaphysics. 

Freedom Against Heredity and Materialism. 

Our consciousness of freedom, again, repudiates 
materialism. When materialism asserts that moral 
choices are the product of chance combinations of 
atoms and molecules in the dim past, the soul denies. 
When a Christian gives a cup of cold water to 
another in the name of Christ, or spends his life as 
a spiritual hero in the effort to redeem the islands 
of the sea, and materialists tell him his entire con- 
duct was predestined by the dancing atoms be- 
fore chaos had become cosmos, the Christian enters 
his quiet but none the less emphatic denial and 
passes on. 

Of course there are good and sound defenses of 
freedom on theological, metaphysical, and psycho- 
logical grounds, as well as on moral and religious. 
Our purpose here does not require that we present 



152 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

them even in outline. We are dealing with an 
axiom. It is because this is an axiomatic truth that 
it holds its place in human thought and experience 
in spite of all metaphysical objections. If a lumi- 
nous object holds place in the firmament through a 
period of thousands of years and is observed by the 
entire human race except a few men of defective 
vision, surely we are warranted in asserting that it 
is a fixed star and denying that it is a meteor. 

Jesus taught the moral freedom of man. Not 
only so, he asserted it for himself. The first re- 
corded event in his life after the story of the birth 
is an account of an act of self-assertion when he was 
twelve years of age. This was the temple experi- 
ence. He did not disobey his parents, but he evi- 
dently had come into a sense of his heritage of indi- 
vidual responsibility. He declared later that he 
" came " into the world, that he would " go " to the 
Father. He asserted that he would " lay down " his 
life and that he would " take it " again. In all his 
intimate union with the Father there is never on 
the Father's part the slightest movement or impulse 
to override the voluntary choice of the Son. 

Christ and Free Choices. 

Jesus inveighed against the idea of heredity as 
giving spiritual rights or privileges apart from 
personal choice and corresponding character. The 
Jews were no true sons of Abraham because they 
were simply physical descendants of Abraham. 



THE MORAL AXIOM 153 

Heredity did not bind the will, and heredity did not 
exempt the will from moral choices and personal 
obedience in the New Covenant. 

Now freedom is self-determination. Of course 
it does not mean that the will is without bias, or 
that human choices are uninfluenced by external 
forces or other human personalities, or by divine 
influences of grace. It only means that when a 
man acts he acts for himself. The choice is his own. 
He is not compelled but impelled. He is self- 
determined. This is the core of manhood and per- 
sonality. This is the inner glory of our being. It 
is the one spark of fire which kindles about our 
humanity its unique splendor. 

In all spheres freedom is self-determination. In 
civic life political freedom is self-government. A 
government of the people by the people for the 
people is a free government. The individual is po- 
litically free only when he exercises his function 
as citizen without artificial or unjust extraneous 
hindrance. A man is intellectually free when he is 
intellectually self-determined. His beliefs are not 
imposed by authority but accepted as his own free 
act. Industrial freedom is the privilege of self- 
determination in the economic world. Unjust dis- 
criminations, class legislation, inequitable adjust- 
ments of the industrial machinery at any point 
impair or subvert industrial freedom. In morals 
freedom is self-determination in conduct. In religion 
freedom is exemption from State compulsion, social 



154 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

compulsion, ecclesiastical or priestly compulsion, 
creedal compulsion, or parental compulsion. Re- 
ligious freedom on its positive side is God appealing 
to the soul through truth and calling forth the soul's 
intelligent and obedient response. It is the soul's 
approach to God through faith and prayer and fel- 
lowship and obtaining grace to help in time of need. 

Christ and the Will. 

Now it is the peculiar and special work of Christ 
to set free the individual will in such manner that 
it unfolds in moral beauty in the personal character 
and coalesces socially with other wills in the beauty 
of a holy society. 

The Anglo-Saxons made one chief contribution 
to the civilization of the world. This was the love 
of individual freedom. Guizot claims that this 
Anglo-Saxon sense of personality and love of 
freedom was found nowhere else. He is right, 
doubtless, so far as the natural man is concerned. 
But it is exactly this gift which Christ bestows. The 
same love of freedom and sense of personality, the 
same self-assertion and love of adventure, the same 
response to the challenge of danger and of great un- 
dertaking in a line of exact analogy to the old Anglo- 
Saxon principle, all this appears in Christianity, but 
with a vast difference. Under Christ all is regen- 
erated and spiritualized. Anglo-Saxon liberty was 
limited only by the conditions of the physical en- 
vironment — mountains and seas, and the stubborn 



THE MORAL AXIOM 1 55 

moods of nature — and only these imposed a check 
upon its career. Christian liberty is limited only by 
the spiritual environment. But the inner impulse 
to personal and social development under Christ is 
like an endless spring fixed in the machinery of 
man's faculties and uncoiling itself through the 
centuries in ever-increasing vigor and power. Anglo- 
Saxon freedom without the Christian fire to purge 
and sanctify it leads to the overman of Nietzsche 
and his followers, the colossus of pitiless and selfish 
power, who glories chiefly in the fact that he is 
destitute of love and the softer virtues. Christian 
freedom on the other hand produces the moral and 
spiritual giants of history who, to the kingly ele- 
ments of power, have always added the priestly ele- 
ments of love and service. Christ made us to be 
" kings and priests unto God." 

Power Conjoined With Freedom. 

A sense of power conjoined with freedom is char- 
acteristic of the best Christians — of the men who 
choose Christ for themselves and make him their 
ideal. Nowhere do you find such spontaneity and 
grandeur, such untrammeled energy and buoyancy 
as in men who do this. Look at Paul. He abounds 
in images which suggest spontaneity and exuberant 
joy. See him yonder when, like a mighty swimmer, 
he rises above the billows of adversity and difficulty, 
and exclaims, " I can do all things through Christ." 
Hear him as he spreads the wings of devotion, and 



156 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

in a splendid flight of mystic passion shouts " To 
me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." Observe 
him as he is caught in the mighty grip of moral 
enthusiasm and self -conquest, exulting in the joy of 
battle : " Thanks be unto God, who always leadeth 
me in victory through Christ." See him again as he 
is impelled onward, the embodiment of flaming love 
and quenchless hope, and deathless ambition, run- 
ning the Christian race as one who treads the air, 
and exclaiming, " Forgetting the things that are 
behind, I press on toward the mark." 

The moral career of Paul reminds one of the 
flight of some mighty eagle long confined in a cage 
and then released ; at first he is uncertain of his new 
feeling of freedom, but at length, becoming con- 
scious of it the heavy eyelids open, he looks about 
him, his drooping wings he gathers for flight and 
then, with a scream of joy, he soars away to the 
clouds. His eagle soul has found its object in God's 
free air. Jesus Christ is the atmosphere of the soul. 
And this is the secret of Christ's authority over men. 
Through him they find themselves. It is a paradox, 
but it is forever true. Men are the slaves of Christ 
because he makes them kings — masters of their own 
destiny. He imparts to them spiritual autonomy 
and thus roots his throne in the deep foundations 
of the soul. Such free moral career, therefore, 
should not be hampered by infant baptism. Leave 
the soul to unfold under Christian nurture. Let 
the beams of Christ fall directly upon the will, the 



THE MORAL AXIOM 1 57 

conscience, and the intelligence of the child, and as 
a rose responds to sunlight, it will unfold beneath 
his rays. 

Evil of Infant Baptism. 

What, we may inquire now, in the light of this 
principle, is the evil of infant baptism? It is mani- 
fold. One side of the matter we have already ex- 
pounded. Here we note another. Its cardinal evil 
is that the religious choice of the child is fore- 
stalled by the parent. The religious destiny of the 
offspring is thus assumed by another without 
warrant from Scripture and without any rational 
justification from other sources. To baptize a child 
in infancy is to treat it not as a free moral per- 
sonality, but as a thing. Many writers of power 
and insight who hold no brief for the Baptists, but 
who discern the tendencies of things, have com- 
mented upon the baleful effects of clerical and 
parental interference with the human will. Guizot 
discussing this general principle says : " For with 
what do they pretend to interfere ? With the reason 
and conscience and future destiny of man — that is to 
say with that which is the closest locked up; with 
that which is most strictly individual; with that 
which is most free. We can imagine how up to a 
certain point, a man, whatever ill may result from it, 
may give up the direction of his temporal affairs to 
an outward authority. We can conceive a notion 
of that philosopher who, when one told him that 



I 5^ THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



his house was on fire said, ' Go tell my wife; I never 
meddle with household affairs/ But when our con- 
science, our thoughts, our intellectual existence are 
at stake— to give up the government of one's very 
soul to the authority of a stranger, is indeed a moral 
suicide ; is indeed a thousand times worse than bodily 
servitude— than to become a mere appurtenance of 
the soil." 1 The same writer defining the function of 
religion in another place remarks : " But while it is 
with human liberty that all religions have to contend, 
while they aspire to reform the will of man, they 
have no means by which they can act upon him— 
they have no moral power over him, but through his 
will, his liberty. When they make use of exterior 
means, when they resort to force, to seduction— 
in short make use of means opposed to the free 
consent of man, they treat him as we treat water, 
wind, or any power entirely physical: they fail in 
their object; they attain not their end; they do not 
reach, they cannot govern the will. Before religions 
can really accomplish their task, it is necessary that 
they should be accepted by the free will of man ; it 
is necessary that man should submit, but it must' be 
willingly and freely, and that he still preserve his 
liberty in the midst of this submission." 2 In these 
words Guizot has touched as with a point of a needle 
the crux of the whole question and sketched for 
us a great principle which is of the essence of 
Christianity. That which does not address the will 

1 " History of Civilization," Vol. I, p. 127. 2 Ibid#> p I3p# 



THE MORAL AXIOM 1 59 

or the intelligence, that ceremony or rite or form 
which does none of these things is alien to the 
genius of the gospel. It belongs to another order 
and another system entirely. 

Take now the case of the child baptized in in- 
fancy. When it grows up it may become immoral, 
a bad boy or youth. This boy may, in order to 
evade the force of Christ's requirement, " Ye must 
be born again," plead his baptism in infancy. " I 
was regenerated then and do not need a new birth 
now," he urges. So also Christ's command to " re- 
pent and be baptized " falls on deaf ears because he 
connects the act of repentance with the act of bap- 
tism which his parents assure him occurred in in- 
fancy. Thus baptism becomes a wall of separation 
between his soul and Christ — an opaque body inter- 
posed between him and the Sun of Righteousness 
throwing him into the shadow of a spiritual eclipse. 

The same result may ensue even when evidences 
of flagrant depravity do not appear in the life. The 
way to a real experience of Christ's saving power, 
of his moral and spiritual energy in the soul, may 
be quite as effectually barred in this case also by a 
baptism which occurred in infancy. For the ques- 
tion of personal repentance and regeneration is 
regarded as a closed question. 

Awakening and Duty. 

But suppose the boy has come into the life that is 
in Christ with all its mighty awakening and quick- 



l6o THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

ening. His soul is keenly alive to duty and he longs 
for opportunities of service. He opens his New 
Testament and reads that men first believed and 
were then baptized. " Repent and be baptized every 
one of you," he reads. " He that believeth and is 
baptized shall be saved." The question of baptism 
then becomes intensely personal. He searches his 
memory in vain for any evidence that he ever obeyed 
this command. All he knows on the subject is hear- 
say. Every other Christian duty he is permitted to 
perform for himself. The Lord's Supper, endur- 
ing temptation, moral struggle, all church and 
spiritual privileges are his except one. In all these 
other things his attitude is one of obedience to 
Christ. But here is a great exception. It was pre- 
determined in some strange way by others, when he 
was in no sense a conscious party to the arrange- 
ment, that he should never be permitted to adopt 
the attitude of obedience to Christ in baptism. Thus 
he finds himself unable to fit his infant baptism into 
the scheme of his life at all. All other elements and 
factors of it run together harmoniously. This factor 
of baptism is alien. It came in on some other prin- 
ciple, one which is irreconcilable with all else in his 
experience and in his relation to Christ and the 
church. If any one says to him he is free to be 
baptized again if he so elects, this does not clear up 
the case of the first baptism. For he sees that it is 
the great exception and can by no process of forcing 
be made to fit into the plan of an obedient life. 



THE MORAL AXIOM l6l 



Doing Violence to the Will. 

The natural effect follows. He is shocked, 
amazed, surprised, and asks, Who tampered thus 
with my will? Who dared assume to perform an 
outward act of religious duty for me? It is thus 
clear that infant baptism violates the moral axiom. 
It does not leave the soul free. It introduces a con- 
fusing principle into the spiritual career of the child 
which proves injurious to thousands. 

The father and the mother, the sponsor and the 
clergy have no right to rob the child of its right 
to obey God for itself. Who does not recall the joy 
of obeying his Lord in baptism? Who has not 
known the truth of the words of the old song— 

Oh, happy day that fixed my choice 
On thee, my Saviour and my God. 

Well may this glowing heart rejoice 
And tell its raptures all abroad. 

Who does not remember that experience who has 
ever had it? Who does not look back to it as the 
brightest day in a lifetime? But infant baptism 
leaves no room for fixing the choice; there is no 
glowing heart, for it is the heart of the unknowing 
babe ; there is no rapture to tell abroad, for in such 
a life baptism is simply a tradition told in later 
years, when the power of understanding has come. 
The wrong of infant baptism is the wrong of a 
human shadow flung between the soul and God. 



l62 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

Then and there the Sun of Righteousness passes 
into eclipse, the meaning of Christianity is confused, 
and the danger is that the soul's life will henceforth 
be spent in the shadow. 

It would be easy to fill many pages with quota- 
tions from men of all Protestant denominations 
who insist upon the principle I am here advocating, 
although they do not all consistently apply it prac- 
tically. Two or three brief citations must suffice, 
however, as our space is limited. Dr. Newman 
Smyth in his " Christian Ethics " denies that men 
sustain the same relation to the church that in 
some countries men sustain to the State Church, as 
in ancient Rome. There all citizens were members 
of the State Church. The Christian church, he 
says, " does not offer its citizenship simply as a 
Christian birthright, but also as a duty to be assumed 
with a personal faith in its truth, and in a free self- 
surrender to its supreme law of life/' 1 He then in- 
sists upon Christ's requirements for church-member- 
ship and denies the right of any to change them. 
Repentance and faith, he says, a voluntary accept- 
ance of the Christian obligation are indispensable. 
" The universal intent of the church as a blessing 
belonging by heaven's decree to all men, should 
serve as a perpetual injunction upon human devices 
or forms which narrow or limit its divine design. 
When we look solely at what may be imposed as 
an indispensable condition of fellowship with Christ 

1 " Christian Ethics," p. 423. 



THE MORAL AXIOM 1 63 

in the visible Church, we may not go one step be- 
yond the Lord's own requirements of discipleship." x 
There is of course no possible way of reconciling 
the principle thus expounded with infant baptism, 
and Doctor Smyth does not succeed in doing so. 

Professor Van Dyke on Freedom. 

Professor Van Dyke also, in his " Gospel for an 
Age of Doubt," expounds the same general principle 
of individual and personal responsibility to Christ. 
" But this receiving," he says, " we need to assert 
again and again, is not a passive thing. It is an 
action of the soul, the opening of a door within the 
heart, the welcoming of a heavenly master. God 
does not save men as a watchmaker who repairs and 
sets a watch, but as a king who recalls his servants 
to their duty, as a Father who makes new revela- 
tions of his love to draw the lost children back to 
himself." Doctor Van Dyke is right. The watch- 
maker deals with a thing, not with a person, and 
hence he may do to it what he wills. But not so in 
dealing with a human soul. Its own integrity as a 
distinct personality cannot be violated. Speaking of 
Buddha and Mahomet he declares that their chief 
fault lies in failure here. " They despise and slight 
personality. Christ accepts and emphasizes it. 
They aim to reduce and evaporate responsibility, 
Christ aims to deepen and increase it." 2 

1 " Christian Ethics," p. 427. 

2 " Gospel for an Age of Doubt," pp. 237, 238. 



164 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

It is abundantly clear from all the foregoing that 
in dealing with children religiously we are strictly 
limited by the nature of the child and by the nature 
of religion. The law is simple and easy to grasp. 
Freedom and responsibility go hand in hand. A rite, 
ceremony, or ordinance, which can be observed or 
performed only with the free consent of the recipient 
can never be administered without evil consequences 
in the absence of that free consent. If free consent 
is the correlative to the intelligent administration of 
the ordinance, according to the nature of the re- 
ligion itself, then administration without free con- 
sent renders it null and void, and mischievous 
besides. 

Many Radical Presuppositions. 

There are many radical presuppositions and as- 
sumptions underlying the practice of infant baptism 
which reenf orce the plea we are making for the right 
of the soul to measure responsibility by freedom. 

Infant baptism assumes the insufficiency of the 
word and the Spirit in parental and Christian 
nurture by anticipating and forestalling the action 
of the word and Spirit before the child's intelligence 
admits of it. Infant baptism assumes that Christ 
demands from the soul what the soul cannot give. 
For there are thousands of infants left without 
baptism, and when the child of the Christian parent 
dies without it, it leaves a heartbreak which no 
church has a right to inflict by such teaching. 



THE MORAL AXIOM 165 

Logically carried out infant baptism excludes 
conversion from the possible experiences of the 
children of church-members and tends toward a 
church without a converted membership. Unless 
counteracted in some way by more spiritual means, 
as is happily true in most of our evangelical Pedo- 
baptist churches in America, the churches become 
increasingly alienated in life and character from 
the Christian ideals. On the continent in Europe, 
however, this condition of affairs has attracted the 
attention and called for the grave comment of men 
like Professor Harnack and others in the State 
churches there. As infant baptism cannot be recon- 
ciled with the essential principles of Christianity, as 
we know these principles from the New Testament, 
so also if resorted to as a means of explaining the 
origin of Christianity in New Testament times it 
would lead us into inextricable confusion, and 
reduce the whole process to an inconceivable 
absurdity. 

Again, infant baptism substitutes natural heredity 
for spiritual, in assuming that natural birth into 
a Christian family entitles per se to the rites and 
ordinances of religion. This introduces a dualistic 
principle into our anthropology, or doctrine of 
human nature, and leaves the general theological 
system unintelligible. Baptism of course may be 
administered to improper subjects under any view 
of it, but to confine it to those who are capable 
of making a credible profession of faith at least 



1 66 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

respects human freedom and supplies a scriptural 
and rational basis for it. 

Natural, Does Not Imply Spiritual, Heredity. 

This ceremony applied to infants also proceeds 
upon the assumption that the Church is like the 
State and that natural birth entitles to membership 
in it. It is too well known to require elaborate 
proof here that in this, as in other respects, Christ's 
Church is radically different from the State. 

In view of the lack of direct or indirect scriptural 
warrant for infant baptism, its practice assumes that 
the church belongs to us and not to Christ, and that 
the terms of admission within its pale are in our 
own hands. If an inferential warrant for the prac- 
tice is insisted upon, as is usually done, this opens 
the door of the church so wide that it will be impos- 
sible to protect it. For all kinds of inferences may 
be drawn from the facts of the New Testament 
which the facts neither authorize nor require. The 
constitution of the church is too vital and important 
a matter to be made subject to precarious deductions 
in the interest of traditional practices inherited from 
the Roman Catholic Church, which consistently and 
avowedly rejects Scripture as the sole authority 
and holds to the joint authority of tradition and 
the church along with that of Scripture. 

Infant baptism is a curious instance in which ex- 
tremes meet. It really interprets God's decree of 
salvation in a manner like that of the antinomians 



THE MORAL AXIOM 1 67 



and hyper-Calvinists. The latter insist that man's 
action is not required by God's grace. Irresistible 
grace will sweep the elect into the kingdom without 
co-operation on their part. This, of course, simply 
ignores human freedom. Infant baptism also as- 
sumes that grace operates without the co-operation 
of the will of the child, but with a striking differ- 
ence. In the one case it is insisted that we must not 
intermeddle with God's plans of persuading sinners 
to believe, while in the other it is urged that we 
must intermeddle and assist God's decree by bring- 
ing the infant to the baptismal font. But, properly 
understood, God's execution of his decree of elec- 
tion is the shining example of wise method in 
dealing with the spirits whom he has created and 
endowed with freedom. For whatever may be myste- 
rious in that decree, whatever beyond human knowl- 
edge and surmise, one thing stands out clearly in 
every instance of its execution which is brought 
before us in the Scriptures. He always makes use 
of persuasion. He respects the will. Even the 
Father in heaven refuses to forget that men are 
persons and not things, and that our freedom is our 
inalienable gift from his gracious hands. 



CHAPTER X 

CHRISTIAN NURTURE 

The close of the last chapter opens the way to a 
consideration of Christian nurture. We devote a 
brief chapter to the subject. In recent years there 
has been more or less discussion of the question 
whether we should expect the conversion of chil- 
dren or not. The position has been taken that 
Christian nurture should lead to the unconscious 
development of Christian character in the child. 
Dr. Horace Bushnell, in his book entitled " Chris- 
tian Nurture," has given striking expression to this 
view. Before offering our own view of the subject, 
it may be well to give a few extracts from Bush- 
nell's discussion by way of introduction. 

In the first chapter of this book Doctor Bushnell 
says that we should hold the view " that the child is 
to grow up a Christian, and never know himself as 
being otherwise." He elaborates this thought at 
length. He says that the organic unity of the family 
requires this, and that Christian principles make it 
necessary. We are guilty of an excessive individ- 
ualism, he thinks, and we need to return to this 
conception of the organic unity of the family. In 
" Christian Nurture " he says : " The tendency of 
all our modern speculations is to an extreme indi- 
168 



CHRISTIAN NURTURE 169 

vidualism, and we carry our doctrine of free will so 
far as to make little or nothing of organic laws; 
not observing that character may be, to a great 
extent, only the free development of exercises pre- 
viously wrought in us, or extended to us, when 
other wills had us within their sphere. All the 
Baptist theories of religion are based on this error. 
They assume, as a first truth, that no such thing is 
possible as an organic connection of character, an 
assumption which is plainly refuted by what we 
see with our eyes and, as I shall by and by show, 
by the declarations of Scripture. ,, 

BUSHNELL AND THE BAPTIST POSITION. 

Doctor Bushnell wholly misstates the Baptist at- 
titude in the above passage. Baptists do not deny that 
there is an organic unity in the family, as we shall see. 
Of course, Doctor Bushnell applies his principle 
in a way which Baptists object to seriously. Infant 
baptism, he thinks, is a logical inference. He says : 
" It is my settled conviction that no man ever ob- 
jected to infant baptism, who had not at the bottom 
of his objection false views of Christian educa- 
tion — who did not hold a notion of individualism, 
in regard to Christian character in childhood, which 
is justified, neither by observation nor by Scripture. 

" It is the prevalence of false views, on this sub- 
ject, which creates so great difficulty in sustaining 
infant baptism in our churches. If children are to 
grow up in sin, to be converted when they come to 



I70 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

the age of maturity, if this is the only aim and ex- 
pectation of family nurture, there really is no mean- 
ing or dignity whatever in the rite." 

If Doctor Bushnell had pushed his investigations 
further, we do not doubt he would have discovered 
that there are other reasons for the growing disre- 
pute of infant baptism among the churches which 
practise it. He might have found that regard for 
the headship of Christ had to do with it. 

Doctor Bushnell has a sermon entitled " The Os- 
trich Nurture," in which he holds up the excessive 
individualism of the day, as he regards it, to a meas- 
ure of ridicule. Parents deal with their children as 
ostriches with their eggs — leave them to be hatched 
out by the forces of nature — leave them exposed to 
the elements. " As a curious illustration of the 
looseness and the unsettled feeling of the times, in 
regard to this great subject, it is just now begin- 
ning to be asserted by some that the true principle of 
training for children is exactly that of the ostrich, 
viz., no training at all; the best government, no 
government. All endeavors to fashion them by the 
parental standards, or to induct them into the belief 
of their parents, is alleged to be a real oppression 
put upon their natural liberty." 

It is quite possible that such a view of child 
nurture exists, but it is among the religiously in- 
different. Doctor BushnelFs extreme statement 
of the case scarcely applies to any religious denom- 
ination to-day, if it ever did. 



christian nurture 171 

The Position of Bushnell. 

In discussing the organic unity of the family, Doc- 
tor Bushnell states his general position. He says : 
" Perhaps I shall be understood with the greatest 
facility if I say that the family is such a body that 
a power over character is exerted therein, which 
can not properly be called influence. We commonly 
use the term influence to denote a persuasive power, 
or a governmental power, exerted purposely, and 
with a conscious design to effect some result in the 
subject. In maintaining the organic unity of the 
family, I mean to assert, that a power is exerted 
by parents over children, not only when they teach, 
encourage, persuade, and govern, but without any 
purposed control whatever. The bond is so intimate 
that they do it unconsciously and undesignedly — 
they must do it. . . All such acts of control therefore 
must, in metaphysical propriety, and as far as the 
child is concerned, be classed under the general de- 
nomination of organic causes. And thus whatever 
power over character is exerted in families one side 
of consent, in the children, and even before they 
have come to the age of rational choice, must be 
taken as organic power, in the same way as if the 
effect accrued under the law of simple contagion." 

Thus we see Doctor Bushnell introduces the princi- 
ple of natural heredity into Christian nurture and 
makes it a controlling factor. To show that this is 
true, he makes the following statement : " In all of 



17 2 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



which it seems to be clearly held that grace shall 
travel by the same conveyance with sin ; that the or- 
ganic unity, which I have spoken of chiefly as an in- 
strument of corruption, is to be occupied and sancti- 
fied by Christ, and become an instrument also of 
mercy and life/' Again he says : " Now the true con- 
ception is, that baptism is applied to the child, on the 
ground of its organic unity with the parents; im- 
parting and pledging a grace to sanctify that unity, 
and make it good in the field of religion. By the 
supposition, however, the child still remains within 
the known laws of character in the house, to receive, 
under these, whatever good may reach him; not 
snatched away by an abrupt, fantastical, and there- 
fore incredible grace. He is taken to be regenerate, 
not historically speaking, but presumptively, on the 
ground of his known connection with the parent 
character, and the divine or church life, which is 
the life of that character. Perhaps I shall be under- 
stood more easily if I say that the child is potentially 
regenerate, being regarded as existing in connection 
with powers and causes that contain the fact, before 
time and separate from time." 

Doctor Bushnell maintains that a child comes to his 
individuality gradually as, of course, we all do, and 
seeks to divide the period of infancy into two sec- 
tions : that of impressions merely, the earliest period, 
and the age of tuitional influences or, as he divides it, 
" the age of existence in the will of the parent, and 
the age of will and personal choice in the child." 



CHRISTIAN NURTURE 173 



The above extracts indicate with sufficient clear- 
ness and fulness the general position of Doctor Bush- 
nell. Let it be said at once that the Baptists have 
no quarrel with his contention as to early influences 
and unconscious impressions upon childhood. They 
offer no objection to the general position that the 
child's life is in very large measure bound up in the 
life of the family. Nor is there any objection in 
general to the idea that Christian nurture in the 
home should be so thorough that the child will be- 
come a Christian at a very early age. The serious 
objection which Baptists offer is to Bushnell's posi- 
tion that the organic unity of the family requires an 
identification of the family with the church. Men 
do not become members of the church on the same 
conditions as members of a family. Again, the 
position of Doctor Bushnell assumes that the law of 
heredity from Christ is the same as the law of 
heredity from Adam. Christ is the new head of the 
race, but men are related to him by faith, and not 
through natural propagation. 

Principles of Christian Nurture. 

We come next to a positive statement of the 
principles of Christian nurture. And, first of all, 
we assert that Christian nurture should recognize 
the organic unity of the family. The family life is 
the omnipresent influence surrounding the child. 
The child is molded by it unconsciously. Before it 
becomes intelligent, while it remains as a potential 



174 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



individual only, it may receive impressions that are 
lasting. If you hold in the palm of your open hand 
a lump of moist clay without closing your fingers 
upon it, the clay will nevertheless bear the imprint 
of the lines in your hand when you lay it down. 
Thus is childhood impressed by its earliest environ- 
ment for good or ill. 

What inference must be drawn from this ? That 
the ceremonies and rites of religion should be forced 
upon the unconscious child? Far from it. The 
proper inference is, let the family life carefully and 
jealously protect the child against premature action 
here. Do not stifle the child's religious life with 
burdens it cannot bear. Guard it from the perils of 
the organic unity of the family, as well as expose 
it to the blessings. 

Church and Family are Distinct. 

A second principle of Christian nurture is that 
the distinction between the church and the family 
must be kept intact. The church implies personal 
relations between actual individuals and Christ, not 
potential individuals thrust into fictitious relations 
with Christ as in infant baptism. We may assume 
that the child will become a Christian, but we dare 
not assume that he is a Christian prior to his own 
choice. 

^ This leads to the third law of Christian nurture, 
viz., that it must respect human personality. Let 
there be a recognition of the fact that in its earlier 



CHRISTIAN NURTURE 175 



stages the child is but a candidate for personality, 
and not a developed person, and let the nurture cor- 
respond to the stage of development. The Baptist 
view of Christian nurture accords with modern peda- 
gogy in its best conclusions. As we shall see in 
a later chapter, the best pedagogy ever respects per- 
sonality, seeks to call forth the latent powers of the 
soul, and jealously guards the nature of the child 
from premature forcing. 

Now, baptism belongs to the stage of intelligence 
and personality, to the stage of tuitional influences, 
and not to the stage of unconscious impressions. 
There is no way to understand New Testament 
baptism save as the personal choice of the individual. 
To apply it therefore to the child in the earliest stage 
of unconscious impressions is premature, like re- 
quiring a child to read the " Anabasis " before it has 
mastered the Greek alphabet. Infant baptism is like 
requiring the mastery of algebraic symbols before 
the boy has learned the multiplication table. Infant 
baptism, in other words, is based on unsound peda- 
gogy. Doctor Bushnell's general view on this point 
is directly against sound principles of pedagogy. He 
has much to say regarding potential regeneration 
in infant baptism, presumptive individuality in ap- 
plying this ordinance to non-intelligent babes. In 
so doing, however, he advocates that which is con- 
tradictory and unreasonable. A babe is a presump- 
tive walker, but it is dressed in long clothes and its 
feet left bare usually in the earliest months, both of 



176 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

which would impede it in the attempt to accomplish 
great things in locomotion. The babe in the 
mother's arms is a presumptive citizen, a potential 
voter, but the State never puts the ballot in the hand 
of babes. Now, in a real sense baptism is the ballot 
of the kingdom of God. It is the outward act 
which the citizen of that kingdom first performs to 
proclaim his citizenship therein. Therefore Chris- 
tian nurture must respect personality. 

Natural and Spiritual Heredity. 

A fourth point to be emphasized in Christian 
nurture is the distinction between natural and spirit- 
ual heredity. Natural heredity connects us with 
Adam through the physical bond. Spiritual heredity 
connects us with Christ through the mediation of 
teachers and preachers. Now, there is a revealed 
method by which the soul becomes personally related 
to Christ and a partaker of the spiritual heredity. 
This includes the attitude of faith, of repentance, 
the recognition of God as Father and Christ as 
Saviour. Much is said in favor of the child's be- 
coming unconsciously a Christian. But the child 
should become consciously a Christian also. Doubt- 
less there are those who are genuine Christians who 
do not remember the time and place of their con- 
version, but unless they carry consciously the ele- 
ments of the relationship necessary to the Christian 
life, they are sadly deprived. It is urged that chil- 
dren should not have a sense of sin. It is true that 



CHRISTIAN NURTURE 1 77 

we should not require of them the same kind of con- 
viction for sin that the hardened sinner has, but if 
the child grows up destitute of the sense of ill 
desert and demerit, its moral character is defective. 
This consciousness of sin is the mainspring of 
growth. It is proper to every man, every woman, 
and every child at the proper age. In its absence 
the tendency becomes marked towards self-com- 
placency. 

We should not impose our molds upon children. 
There are four of these molds to be avoided. One 
is experimental. We should not insist that the 
child have an experience identical in detail with the 
adult. Another is the intellectual mold. We should 
not insist that the child be able to give the same ex- 
haustive account of his Christian life as the older 
person. The elements will be there, but frequently 
the child is unable to state them completely. Again, 
we should avoid imposing a theological mold upon 
the child, or rather, substituting a theological mold 
for vital faith. It is not difficult for a bright child 
to learn the catechism, but knowing the catechism 
is not knowing Christ. And finally, we should not 
impose the ceremonial mold. Baptism is entirely 
out of place for a child before it has reached the 
age of understanding. Otherwise, it becomes a 
mere mold into which we seek to force the child's 
nature. Apply all these means of nurture as the 
child is able to receive them. But there must be 
response on the part of the child, not compulsion. 

M 



i78 the axioms of religion 

Elements of Christian Life the Same. 

When all is said, however, it remains true that 
the elements of the Christian life are the same in 
the child as in the adult. There is variation, of 
course. In some cases one aspect of the spiritual ex- 
perience is emphasized, and in others other aspects. 
The elements are the same. A child may become 
a Christian so early as scarcely to know the grosser 
forms of sin. Nevertheless, the sense of demerit 
and shortcoming is a necessary element in a rounded 
spiritual character. The difference, therefore, be- 
tween the conversion of a child and an adult is one 
of degree, not of kind. One seed may be planted 
in good soil, with the right environment and be 
subject to wise cultivation until it bursts and roots 
itself firmly and springs upward to fruitage. 
Another seed may fall in scanty soil upon a stone, be 
subject to the elements, and yet swell until it bursts, 
striking its root downward, rending the stone and 
drawing nourishment from the soil below, while it 
springs upward also and bears fruit. Now, the life 
process in the seed is the same in both cases, only 
in the latter case the process was more violent. 
Such is the difference between the conversion of 
children and men. It is a difference easily recog- 
nized and important. 

A child may be said to be converted when there is 
recognized the presence in the child of a perma- 
nent Christian motive and struggle. Observe that 



CHRISTIAN NURTURE 179 

the motive is to be Christian, and it is to be abid- 
ing. We are to look not so much for attainment as 
for struggle. These two elements — the Christian 
motive and the Christian struggle — when they ap- 
pear as permanent in the child's life, are sure indi- 
cations that Christ has come into that life. 

The Old and New Covenants. 

We must recognize in the next place in our 
Christian nurture, the distinction between the old 
and the new covenant. Writers who advocate in- 
fant baptism uniformly go back to the Mosaic sys- 
tem and plead the solidarity of Israel and the 
theocracy. They forget the vital distinctions be- 
tween the church and theocracy. The common- 
wealth of Israel was localized; the church is a 
universal institution. Israel was maintained by 
positive laws and outward ceremonies ; the church 
through spiritual laws. Israel was preserved 
through the organic physical bond and family ties, 
the church through the spiritual. One needs only 
to recall the strong language of Jesus concerning 
the individual in relation to family and friends to 
recognize how far Christianity is from Judaism. A 
man's foes shall be they of his own household. The 
Christian must forsake father and mother, sister 
and brother, if need be, in order to follow Christ. 
Much is made also by those who advocate infant 
baptism of the fact that in the first chapter of Acts 
the promise is announced to the hearers and to their 



l8o THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

children. The point is made that infants are in- 
cluded in the promise under the gospel because 
children are named. Doubtless the reference is to 
descendants rather than to little children, though of 
course children are included in so far as they are 
able to accept and partake of the blessings of the 
gospel. 

But these advocates forget the sharp contrast 
which is made between the old and the new covenant 
in the eighth chapter of Hebrews. In the eleventh 
verse of that chapter the statement is made that 
" they shall not teach every man his neighbor, and 
every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: 
for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. ,, 
Here we have a distinct statement that there are 
no exceptions in the kingdom of God under the new 
covenant. The new covenant does not include those 
who know the Lord and those who are unconscious 
infants and cannot know him. And this simply 
makes clear the fact that the kingdom of God, as 
revealed by Christ, is not a kingdom of heredity or a 
kingdom of magic, but a kingdom of truth. With 
gladness Baptists obey Christ's words, " Suffer the 
little children to come unto me " but they decline to 
bring them to him by force while unconscious 
infants by applying religious ceremonies without 
meaning save on the theory of magical efficacy. 
The new covenant does not require this. The new 
covenant is unlike the old in many ways, and they 
are not to be confounded. 



CHRISTIAN NURTURE l8l 

The Child Environment. 

We name, as a further condition of Christian 
nurture that there should be created an environment 
of the child which will predispose it to Christ and 
the church. Environment counts for more in child- 
hood than at any other period. There is no more 
vital element in the production of character in the 
earliest stages. A recent writer on the education 
of children has emphasized this in a striking way in 
connection with Shakespeare. He shows how 
Shakespeare's imagery, as it appears in his poetic 
writings, was derived largely from the environ- 
ment of his childhood. Take this verse: 

When daisies pied and violets blue, 
And lady smocks, all silver white, 

And cuckoo buds of yellow hue, 
Do paint the meadows with delight. 

In this verse there are, of course, many very 
pretty floral images. Now if the traveler examine 
closely the meadows about Stratford where Shakes- 
peare was a boy, he will find these flowers growing 
to-day. Shakespeare had poetic genius, but his 
genius required material to work upon, just as a 
fire requires fuel to maintain it. The environment 
of childhood helped to make the poet Shakespeare. 
If we surround our children with the fadeless 
flowers of spiritual truth; if the home life is sweet 
and Christly; if patience and gentleness and love, 



l82 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

combined with firmness and discipline and high 
purpose, are the traits of character discerned by the 
child in the parent, there is strong probability that 
they will be reproduced in him. 

That is a striking picture in the Gospel of Luke 
where Jesus as a boy of twelve, upon the occasion 
of his first visit to the temple, is held spellbound 
amid its scenes. For the first time the great and 
wondrous significance of the Jewish system fell 
upon the sensitive soul of Jesus. All of it had a 
symbolic reference to his own person and mission. 
Doubtless there was an awakening in his soul, a 
calling forth thus of the powers that were in him, 
and a quickening into a new sense of his mission 
and destiny. Environment lifted him to a new stage 
in his career under God's blessing. Even so should 
it be with childhood ever — expose the soul of the 
child to the truth, surround it with every incentive 
to holy living, permit it to respond to grace in the 
home circle. 

A Final Suggestion. 

A final suggestion for Christian nurture is that 
all the elements of Christian character be brought 
into the conscious experience of the child at the 
earliest possible moment. Let religion take its 
proper form of personal experience. Art is the 
response of man's soul to beauty. Science is his 
response to truth. Religion is the response of the 
soul of man to God and righteousness. Let not the 



CHRISTIAN NURTURE 183 

ordinances of religion be applied before the capacity 
for response is present, but let truth and piety be- 
come the enveloping atmosphere of the child's life- 
its spiritual universe, so to speak — until it responds 
thereto. As physical nature calls forth the interest 
and the effort of the child, as the beautiful sky above 
attracts his steadfast gaze, as the stars that stud it 
at night kindle his imagination, as trees and moun- 
tains and rivers, as pebbles and brooks and flowers, 
call forth his nature and stir it into new energy, so 
let the truths of Christianity, the fact of God's 
fatherhood and Christ's saviourhood, of beautiful 
Christian character, and of eternal life, stand out as 
the objects of his spiritual world, warming him into 
life, and under God's blessing leading him out into 
the Christian profession. When the mind is suf- 
ficiently advanced to grasp the significance of the 
church, the ordinances, the doctrines, let these be 
interpreted, and let there flow into his soul the tide 
of joy and peace which comes from a recognition 
of the meaning of these things. But in all this let 
vital individual faith in Christ be recognized as the 
basic fact. 

Unquestionably childhood is the strategic point 
in Christian culture, and in all our religious bodies 
increasing attention should be given to this great 
theme. A modern poet has symbolized the beauty 
of the task of training the child. Browning has a 
little poem in which he describes a picture. The 
picture attracts the attention of the beholder because 



184 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

an angel is seen close to a tomb engaged intently in 
some task which at first does not appear. Over- 
head the heavens are opened, and angelic hands 
beckon the angel upward. On the horizon earthly 
enterprises loom large and beckon the angel to them, 
but he remains unheeding, busily engaged in some 
great task. As the beholder looks closely he dis- 
covers by the side of the angel a little child, kneel- 
ing, with folded hands and closed eyes and uplifted 
face. There is no higher task for angels or men 
than to teach a little child to pray. 



CHAPTER XI 

the religio-civic axiom : a free church in a 
free state 

Relations Between Church and State. 

The religio-civic axiom which states the Ameri- 
can principle of the relations between Church and 
State is so well understood and is accepted by the 
people of the United States so generally and so 
heartily that it is unnecessary to spend time in 
pointing out at length what the axiom implies. Mr. 
Bryce in his " American Commonwealth " remarks : 
" It is accepted as an axiom by all Americans that 
the civil power ought to be not only neutral and im- 
partial as between entirely different forms of faith, 
but ought to leave these matters entirely on one side, 
regarding them no more than they regard the artis- 
tic or literary pursuits of the citizens. " x In short 
the entire contents of the axiom is summed up in the 
statement that the State has no ecclesiastical and the 
Church no civic function. Mr. Bryce also says: 
" Of all the differences between the Old World and 
the New this is perhaps the most salient. Half the 
wars of Europe, half the internal troubles that have 
vexed European States, from the Monophysite con- 
troversies in the Roman empire of the fifth century 

1 " American Commonwealth," Vol. II, pp. 572, 573. 

185 



l86 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

down to the Kulturkampf in the German empire of 
the ninenteenth, have arisen from theological dif- 
ferences or from the rival claims of Church and 
State." * In this connection also I give a state- 
ment from Buckle. He says in his " History of 
Civilization " : " During almost a hundred and 
fifty years, Europe was afflicted by religious wars, 
religious massacres, and religious persecutions ; 
not one of which would have arisen if the great 
truth had been recognized that the State has no 
concern with the opinions of men, and no right 
to interfere even in the slightest degree with 
the form of worship which they may choose to 
adopt. This principle was, however, formerly un- 
known or at all events unheeded; and it was not 
until the middle of the seventeenth century that the 
great religious contests were brought to a final close 
and the different countries settled down to their pub- 
lic creeds." 2 Such quotations might be indefinitely 
multiplied, but it is needless. Neither of the writers 
quoted is an American, and yet each states the princi- 
ple in a manner which is in complete unison with our 
way of regarding the matter. For many centuries the 
struggle between Church and State was an unequal 
one. By a sort of spiritual instinct the church 
tugged at her chains with various movements of 
protest against the English and European establish- 
ments. It was like the struggle between the eagle 

1 " American Commonwealth," Vol. II, p. 570. 
1 " History of Civilization," Vol. I, p. 190. 



THE RELIGIO-CIVIC AXIOM 187 

and the serpent. The church, as the eagle in the 
contest, was sometimes dragged down into the dust 
by the foe. Again, with the serpent's sinewy coils 
about her body she would rise heavily into the air 
only to be dragged downward again. At length 
the eagle, with beak and talons dripping with the 
blood of her slain foe, mounts upward and builds 
her nest on a lofty crag forever beyond the serpent's 
reach. This was when Roger Williams founded the 
commonwealth of Rhode Island. A new era in man's 
spiritual history began then. 

The leadership of the Baptists of Rhode Island 
and Virginia in introducing the doctrine of com- 
plete separation of Church and State has already 
been pointed out in a previous chapter. Indeed two 
great conceptions were formally promulgated by 
the Baptists of the seventeenth century in their 
creeds and Confessions, which in a striking manner 
show that they were far in advance of Christendom 
in general in their views as to the essential nature 
of Christianity. One of these is the doctrine of 
world-wide missions, which is absent from the West- 
minster and other creeds of the period. It is a well- 
known fact that Christendom at large was appar- 
ently dead to this great obligation until William 
Carey aroused it. Yet in their " Confession of 
Faith," issued by churches in and around London 
in 1660, the Baptists of England promulgated 
the doctrine and obligation of world-wide missions 
as we shall see in a later chapter. 



l88 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



Another Great Baptist Principle. 

But we are here more directly interested in the 
other great Baptist principle in which they ante- 
dated others. Their view of soul freedom and sepa- 
ration of Church and State they promulgated in 
their earliest known creeds and their practice has 
never parted company with their doctrine. We 
find the following in the " London Confession," 
published in 1644. After declaring the duty of 
obedience to magistrates and all legally constituted 
authorities in all things lawful the Confession in 
the forty-ninth article says : " But in case we find 
not the magistrate to favor us herein, yet we dare 
not suspend our practice because we believe we 
ought to go on in obedience to Christ, in professing 
the faith which is declared in the holy Scriptures 
and this our confession of faith a part of them ; and 
that we are to witness to the truth of the Old and 
New Testament unto the death if necessity require, 
in the midst of trials and afflictions, as his saints of 
old have done/' etc. 1 In the next article it is de- 
clared that it is lawful for a Christian to be a magis- 
trate and to take oaths. Under the forty-eighth 
article the following language occurs : " As we can- 
not do anything contrary to our understandings and 
consciences, so neither can we forbear the doing of 
that which our understandings and consciences bind 
us to do ; and if the magistrate should require us to 

1 Underhill: " Confession of Faith," pp. 45, 46. 



THE RELIGIO-CIVIC AXIOM 189 



do otherwise, we are to yield our persons in a passive 
way to their power, as the saints of old have done/' x 
Of like tenor with the above are all the Baptist 
creeds. There has never been a time in their his- 
tory, so far as that history is known to us, when 
they wavered in their doctrine of a free Church 
in a free State. Nowhere in the American colo- 
nies before the Revolution, save in Rhode Island 
and among Virginia Baptists and in a few great 
minds such as Madison and others like him, had this 
novel and far-reaching conception taken root. Men 
in general regarded the separation of Church and 
State as a doctrine of anarchy and chaos, and hon- 
estly believed that its practical application would 
quench the sun of religion in the heaven of man's 
spiritual hopes. 

It is a singular fact, to be noted in this connec- 
tion, that many writers of great intelligence in other 
respects even to-day fail to grasp clearly the distinc- 
tion between religious toleration and religious free- 
dom. Doctor Bacon in his " History of American 
Christianity " falls into the common error of refer- 
ring to the Maryland colony under the Calverts as 
an example of religious liberty ; whereas all who are 
familiar with the distinction know that in Mary- 
land not religious liberty in the modern sense and 
in the ancient Baptist sense, but only toleration was 
enjoyed. We find the same error in an address so 
recent as that of one of the speakers at the Con- 



1 Underhill, p. 45- 



I90 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

gress of Arts and Science in St. Louis. Americans 
of to-day would no more rest content under a sys- 
tem of mere religious toleration than they were 
willing to endure taxation without representation 
under George the Third. 

English Wrestling With the Problem. 

It is instructive to observe how the English 
people have wrestled with the problem of the rela- 
tions of Church and State. Of course the Noncon- 
formist bodies have solved the problem for them- 
selves on its theoretical side, although in recent years 
they have been called upon to wage a noble war of 
passive resistance against an oppressive education 
act. The English Nonconformists in this matter are 
in line with their best traditions as descendants of 
the freedom-loving Anglo-Saxons. 

Many English writers who favor an established 
church have sought to justify it on various grounds. 
A glance at these theories will prepare us to con- 
sider briefly the theoretical grounds for our Ameri- 
can principle. 

The principle known as Erastianism has for a 
long time exerted a powerful influence over English 
thinking on the subject. This view asserts that the 
Church as such has no governing power. A part 
of the function of the State is to govern the Church. 

Hooker maintained that in any country, Church 
and State are to be regarded not as two societies 
but as one. This one organization viewed on its 



THE RELIGIO-CIVIC AXIOM I9I 

temporal side is the commonwealth, on its ecclesias- 
tical it is the church. Warburton took the position 
that while the Church and State were originally 
separate and independent they entered into an alli- 
ance and formed a union by contract, with condi- 
tions on each side. Coleridge distinguished between 
the national and the visible church of Christ. The 
national church is the general community with 
officers who are partly civil and partly ecclesiastical, 
while the visible church is a spiritual kingdom not 
of this world, self-governing and self-supporting. 
Gladstone advocated a view of the State like that 
proclaimed by Milton that the State is a " gigantic 
moral person." Gladstone asserted that as a moral 
person the State is bound to act in the name of 
Christ for God's glory, and that the promotion of 
religion is the chief end in government. Macaulay 
replied to Gladstone that the State has no such in- 
herent or inalienable function. Government is pri- 
marily for the protection of life and property, urged 
Macaulay, and it is no more bound to promote re- 
ligion directly than a life insurance company is so 
bound. But Macaulay held that the State may use 
religion for its own ends, especially education. 
Chalmers, in Scotland, maintained that the State 
should foster some one denomination on the ground 
of the truth held, if possible, and if not on this, then 
on some other ground. For only thus could Chris- 
tianity exert its proper influence over men. The 
idea seemed ingrained in the English mind. 



192 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

Canon Fremantle in his work " The World the 
Subject of Redemption " maintains the theory of 
Christian Nationalism. In contrast with the limited 
view of the church as concerned chiefly with wor- 
ship and dogma Fremantle says : " The church will 
be here presented as the social State in which 
the Spirit of Christ reigns; as embracing the gen- 
eral life and society of man, and identifying itself 
with these as much as possible ; as having for its ob- 
ject to imbue all human relations with the spirit of 
Christ's self-renouncing love, and thus to change the 
world into a kingdom of God." * The means for 
the realization of this programme of Christianity 
is to be found in Christian Nationalism. The state- 
ment of Fremantle's view of the relations between 
Church and State is as follows : " The principle 
of the royal supremacy means that the Christian 
community as a whole, represented by its sovereign, 
is to be supreme over all its parts." 2 The Church is 
regarded as a subordinate part of the State and as 
necessarily falling under its jurisdiction. Fre- 
mantle's general theory is a singular attempt to 
unite an antiquated conception of the relations of 
Church and State with a very modern view as to the 
aims of the Church. It is like cutting off the head of 
the Bartholdi Statue of Liberty in New York har- 
bor and attaching it to the trunk of the Egyptian 
sphinx. 

1 " The World the Subject of Redemption," pp. 1, 7, 8. 
2 Ibid., p. 214. 



the religio-civic axiom i93 

Four Leading Considerations. 

Now it is clear to the student of English theory 
on the subject of the relations between Church and 
State that four leading considerations have affected 
English thinkers in their persistent efforts to jus- 
tify an establishment of religion under government. 
The first is tradition and the conservative tendency 
of the human mind. The English church was estab- 
lished, therefore it ought to be established. For- 
tunately in America we had no such longstanding 
institution under national patronage to fetter our 
thinking when we organized the present govern- 
ment. The second consideration was moral. Eng- 
lishmen felt that government is for moral ends. 
They were little influenced by Rousseau's social con- 
tract theory of government. If the government is 
for moral ends it is closely akin to religion in its 
function and purpose. Religion indeed is the best 
instrument for the realization and accomplishment 
of moral ends. Hence Church and State should be 
one, with the church subordinate as a part of the 
larger whole. 

The third consideration was the objection to a 
dualistic conception of human society. A free 
Church in a free State seemed to Englishmen like 
two nations trying to occupy the same territory at 
the same time. Fremantle's view seems to have 
grown out of some such considerations as the above 
along with a fourth, viz. : that Christ's kingdom is 

N 



194 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

destined to embrace all life. Thus from the political 
side and from the religious it seemed incongruous 
and absurd for two sovereignties to attempt to exist 
side by side on the same ground and among the 
same people. 

The American theory of Church and State which 
the prophetic soul of Roger Williams discerned 
clearly in the early seventeenth century, which the 
English Baptists also grasped and put into formal 
statement a little later in the same century, which 
Virginia Baptists championed against the established 
church in the eighteenth century, and which through 
their influence came to full expression in the first 
amendment to the Constitution of the United States, 
is in all respects opposed to the English and Euro- 
pean theory. We thus make a real contribution to 
the world's civilization. 

Americans do not deny that the ends for which 
government exists are moral, but they do deny 
that those ends are religious. Mr. Bryce is scarcely 
correct in the statement that our view regards the 
general government simply as a great business 
organization created by the people for certain speci- 
fied purposes which do not include matters of the 
church or religion. While Americans have spent 
little time in theorizing about the nature of the 
State I think it is a fair inference from the Declara- 
tion of Independence that in the main they regard 
our Constitution as grounded in essential moral 
principles, and that ultimately government is the 



THE RELIGIO-CIVIC AXIOM I95 

expression of moral relations which necessarily exist 
in human society and created by God. 1 

It does not follow, however, that because an insti- 
tution is the expression of moral relations in one 
sphere that it is meant to promote moral ends in all 
spheres. Church and State might in a perfect society 
coalesce into one ; but meantime their functions must 
be kept separate. Specialization is the law of their 
harmonious and healthful operation as society is to- 
day. In his reply to Gladstone on Church and 
State Macaulay put the case graphically. Said he : 
" It is of much more importance that the knowledge 
of religious truth should be widely diffused than 
that the art of sculpture should flourish among us. 
Yet it by no means follows that the Royal Academy 
ought to unite with its present functions those of 
the Society for promoting Christian knowledge, to 
distribute theological tracts, to send forth mission- 
aries, turn out Nollekens for being a Catholic, Ba- 
con for being a Methodist, and Flaxman for being a 
Swedenborgian. For the effect of such folly would 
be that we should have the worst possible academy 
of arts, and the worst possible Society for the Pro- 
motion of Christian Knowledge. ,, The same princi- 
ple applies to the relations of Church and State. 

Functions of Church and State Distinct. 

The functions of Church and State are quite 
distinct. The American view is based on funda- 

1 Cf. Newman Smyth's " Christian Ethics," pp. 26^. 



I96 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

mental facts of human society and of the gospel. 
The Church is a voluntary organization, the State 
compels obedience. One organization is temporal, 
the other spiritual. Their views as to penal offenses 
may be quite different, that being wrong and 
punishable in the Church which the State cannot 
afford to notice. The direct allegiance in the 
Church is to God, in the State it is to law and 
government. One is for the protection of life and 
property, the other for the promotion of spiritual life. 
An established religion, moreover, subverts the prin- 
ciple of equal rights and equal privileges to all which 
is a part of our organic law. Both on its political 
and on its religious side the doctrine of the separa- 
tion of Church and State holds good. Civil liberty 
and soul liberty alike forbid their union. As Dr. 
Newman Smyth remarks : " History has perma- 
nently closed these two ways — the way of bringing 
Christ before the judgment seat of Caesar to be 
crucified, and the way of putting Christ on Caesar's 
throne to rule the kingdoms of this world/' 

Now it is important to keep in mind the mean- 
ing of the phrase " a free Church in a free State," 
if we are to avoid confusion in thought at certain 
points in our practical application of the principle. 
If at any point, such as the legal holding of prop- 
erty, the functions of the church carry it over into 
the civil realm, then we must construe such function 
as properly pertaining to the church and vice versa. 
But this does not destroy the freedom of either 



THE RELIGIOCIVIC AXIOM I97 

Church or State. The Church is compatible with 
the State but entirely independent of it. That is 
to say, it is free. It is a spiritual commonwealth. 
The citizenship of its members is in heaven, as 
Paul declares, although at the same time they are 
citizens of an earthly State. There will, of course, 
remain a borderland where it will not always be 
clear how to discriminate and apply the principle 
correctly. 

Important Illustrations of Statement Made. 

We may note before closing this chapter two or 
three illustrations of the statement made. One is 
the appropriation of public money for sectarian 
schools. This is a flagrant violation of the prin- 
ciple and is a long step toward the establishment 
of one or more denominations in governmental 
support. Direct gifts of money to religious bodies 
by the general government is of the essence of union 
of Church and State. It is not surprising, there- 
fore, that it was when a Baptist, General Morgan, 
was Commissioner of Indian Affairs that this gov- 
ernment, under his leadership, abandoned the prac- 
tice of appropriating money for sectarian schools. 

As to the Bible in the public schools also there has 
been much difference of opinion among Americans. 
Baptists very generally and consistently oppose the 
public reading of the Bible in the schools, because 
they respect the consciences of all others. The un- 
derlying question is a difficult one. The State, as 



I98 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

it is based on the franchise, and as the franchise im- 
plies intelligence, quite properly provides through 
its educational system for making its citizens intelli- 
gent. Can it be said also that the State, as it is based 
on the franchise, and the franchise implies moral 
character, quite properly provides through moral 
teaching in the public schools for making its citizens 
moral? Religious teaching as distinguished from 
moral teaching is of course excluded. The answer 
to the question must be in the affirmative within cer- 
tain limits. Moral teaching is not objectionable even 
to atheists. A moral text-book sufficiently elemen- 
tary and simple, containing extracts from other 
works containing wholesome moral teaching, might 
be employed to advantage without violating any 
man's conscience. 

The exemption of church property from taxation 
is another point which has been much contested. 
All religious bodies alike have enjoyed the privilege. 
It has been defended on various grounds as not in- 
volving the union of Church and State. The church 
enhances the value of all other property, adds to 
the desirability of any community as a place of resi- 
dence, builds up our civilization in many ways, and 
is the most efficient of all police forces. It thus 
gives a quid pro quo to the State and more than 
earns its exemption from taxation. The governor 
of Montana a few years ago in a message to the 
legislature made a special request that all church 
property be exempt from taxation as the best means 



THE RELIGIO-CIVIC AXIOM 1 99 

of advancing the welfare of the entire territory and 
speeding it on its way to complete civilization. 

But others contest the point. They maintain that 
to exempt churches from taxation is to subsidize 
religion and to subsidize religion is to subvert our 
doctrine of a free Church in a free State. They urge 
also that to tax church property would have a 
wholesome effect in preventing extravagance in 
church architecture and in other ways would react 
favorably upon religion. 

Now unquestionably a theoretical justification can 
be made out for either view, for exemption as well 
as taxation. It runs thus: To impose a tax is to 
assert sovereignty; but the State is not sovereign 
over the Church whose allegiance is to God alone. 
Moreover, to concede the right to tax involves a 
concession of the right to confiscate upon proper 
occasion. Thus the right to tax on the part of the 
State destroys the freedom of the Church, so that 
it is no longer a free Church in a free State. 

A Question of Interpretation. 

After all, however, the question is one of the in- 
terpretation of a principle. If the sovereign State and 
the sovereign Church agree that a particular prac- 
tice capable of theoretical justification in opposite 
directions is not a violation of a general princi- 
ple of government and of religion then that inter- 
pretation must stand. Experience alone will demon- 
strate the wisdom or unwisdom of the interpreta- 



200 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

tion. Time alone can give the final answer to many 
questions. Up to the present it cannot be said that 
time has demonstrated the unwisdom of exempting 
religious property from taxation. To impose a tax 
on such property would be a deadly blow to educa- 
tion as well as to religion. 



CHAPTER XII 

THE SOCIAL AXIOM : LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS 
YOURSELF 

Two truths have emerged into crystal clearness in 
the thinking of men under the influence of Christian 
civilization in modern times. One is the worth of 
the individual. The old Greek and Roman civiliza- 
tions as well as those farther east never recognized 
this truth. Christ taught it and made it current. 
Since he lived it has been slowly becoming a part of 
the spiritual wealth of mankind. The other truth is 
supplementary to the above. It is that man is a 
social being. Monasticism in a way emphasized the 
worth of the individual but it did not value properly 
the social side of man's nature. 

A Social Theology. 

In recent years there has arisen what is called a 
" social theology." Its aim is to supply a counter- 
poise to the excessive individualism of much of the 
prevailing theology. To be saved as an individual, 
to be " in the ark of safety " provided by the gospel, 
to escape from death and hell, has often been the 
sum of Christian teaching. By way of reaction 
men are demanding a sociological gospel. Some are 
asserting that individualism is a false teaching and 

201 



202 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

that the gospel aims primarily at social results. 
Frequently this takes the form of an assertion that a 
change in environment is all that is necessary to 
effect a change in character. The happy are the 
good. The way to make men good is to make them 
happy. The way to make them happy is to make 
them comfortable. Good houses to live in, good 
food to eat, and good clothes to wear are the sum 
total of the equipment required to regenerate soci- 
ety. The apostles of this and similar doctrines rail 
much at the churches for failure to insist upon 
this view. 

The social sins of the day are many and grievous 
it must be confessed. They are well known and 
need not be dealt with here at length. We are in 
sore need of better divorce laws. There is perhaps 
no evil which strikes so directly at the vitals of 
any civilization as that which corrupts the family 
and home life. This condition is a marked character- 
istic of decadent nations in nearly every instance. 
The prevalence of graft in business and in politics 
is only too well known in America to-day. Stu- 
dents of our social and political life from the out- 
side, like Mr. Bryce and others, seem most of all 
struck with the absorption of our people in money- 
getting. The money-getter is the American hero. 
Failure and success in life are estimated on the 
basis of the question whether a man is a money- 
getter or not. Commercial success is too often 
measured by the amount of money made regardless 



THE SOCIAL AXIOM 203 



of the methods. The money-getting quality is in- 
dispensable in the pastor and the college presi- 
dent. Novel-writing and book-writing generally are 
largely with a view to profits. Political parties are 
called to the judgment seat of financial prosper- 
ity and are voted in or out according as they are 
able to wave the magic wand which sets the silver 
floods flowing. 

The abuses connected with child labor in our 
factories have also attracted much attention and 
should receive careful thought. Another form of 
social service which presents peculiar difficulties 
is to be seen in the modern problem of charity and 
poor relief. Much thinking and planning yet re- 
mains to be done on this subject before a solution 
is in sight. Many of our reformers are telling us 
that the most fundamental and trying of all our 
evils is the competitive system, and that relief at 
this point would bring relief at all points. Closely 
connected with the money-getting passion of Ameri- 
cans is the great question of the stewardship of 
money. This, of course, in a peculiar manner affects 
professing Christians. The vast missionary and 
educational enterprises of the Christian denomina- 
tions present an opportunity and enforce an obliga- 
tion for social service unparalleled in the history of 
the world. We might extend this enumeration in- 
definitely. What has been said is sufficient to indi- 
cate the urgency of the need and the vastness of the 
opportunity. 



204 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

A Question as to Duty. 

The question is what is the duty of a free Church 
in a free State where these conditions prevail? It 
must be replied that a mere sociological Christianity 
must fail since it ignores the basal law of Christianity. 
To regenerate the individual is the sole condition of 
permanent moral progress in the social sphere. It 
is curious to note the superficial view men have held 
as to human progress. Mr. Buckle in his history of 
civilization declares that morals have had little or 
nothing to do with human progress because morality 
is static or fixed; while intellect which is dynamic 
and progressive has carried on the process. Chris- 
tian morality may be " static " in the sense in which 
all ultimate things are static. The summit of Mount 
Blanc is " static," the constellations in a sense are 
" static/' and so is the Christian moral ideal. For 
this very reason, however, along with its elevation 
above the ordinary attainment of men, and its ideal 
quality, it has been the " flying goal " of the race 
for two thousand years. This ideal assumes a moral 
character in harmony with it, and that character 
is created by the regeneration of the individual. 
Therefore Christianity cannot abandon its doctrine 
of " regenerated individualism " without commit- 
ting suicide. It is by means of regenerated individ- 
uals associated together as churches that Christi- 
anity becomes a leaven to transform the social order. 
This is primary and fundamental. 



THE SOCIAL AXIOM 205 



Now it is on this foundation that the moral edifice 
rises in individual and in social life. Regeneration 
contains in itself the seeds of all righteousness. No 
moral interest lies outside the sphere of the church 
of Christ. Doubtless much of the failure of the 
church to leaven the social relations of men has 
grown out of the failure to recognize this truth. 
The duty of the pulpit and the church, therefore, 
may be stated in several ways. First of all there 
is need that this truth be grasped; the new birth 
means the regeneration of the entire life. Salva- 
tion is not a fragment. A Christian has been saved, 
he is being saved, and he will be saved. The great 
word salvation so understood becomes a far greater 
conception than that of a deliverance from death and 
hell simply and exclusively. 

The Church ought to exert a powerful influence 
upon the State. The Church cannot take the State 
but it does take the citizens of the State into itself. 
It cannot undertake commercial enterprises with 
wisdom or safety but it does have the moral and 
spiritual guidance of business men. One of the 
most serious difficulties to be overcome is the arti- 
ficial grouping of men with moral ideals to corre- 
spond. Politicians have become a professional class 
with us. Business men in like manner in important 
respects think and act on certain accepted lines and 
ideals, and church-members also tend to become 
segregated from other interests. Sound moral ideas 
should penetrate all groups. 



206 the axioms of religion 

New Ethical Questions. 

Many ethical questions have arisen in our civiliza- 
tion which are entirely new. One man regards the 
trust as the sum of all evils and another maintains 
that it is the inevitable goal of commercial evolution. 
This illustrates, along with many other things, how 
our civilization since the industrial revolution is, 
in a real sense of the word, yet in the making. 
Christian thinkers have before them the great task 
of thinking these ethical problems through. We 
have indeed what is called the " new political 
economy/' Professor Ely has said that the new 
political economy is simply the attempt to apply to 
society at large the principles of Christ's parable of 
the talents. 

Christian men cannot hold themselves aloof from 
public questions and public service if they are to 
embody the principles of Christianity in their prac- 
tical conduct. Roughly speaking Christians may be 
classified as monastics, mystics, moralists, and mis- 
sionaries. The monastic life is not in good repute, 
although the disposition to shrink from public serv- 
ice is in its essence the old monkish refusal to 
" look into the swarthiest face of things " and dis- 
charge unpleasant duty. The, mystic loves com- 
munion with God and so far is in line with all great 
souls of the past. But " if a man is imperfect who is 
apart from the divine, so is a man imperfect who is 
apart from the human." The moralist is mistaken 



THE SOCIAL AXIOM 207 

only when he attempts to obtain the fruit without 
the roots or is content with personal and indifferent 
to social morality. Some one has brought out the 
point by an incident in the experience of Alice. 
Alice in Wonderland saw a cat with a grin on 
its face. The cat gradually faded away until only 
the grin remained. This, however, was in the 
Wonderland of Alice, not in the real world. You 
may have a face without a grin, but not a grin with- 
out a face. You cannot produce morality apart from 
its spiritual cause. The missionary is mastered by 
the moral and evangelistic impulse. He is an aggres- 
sive advocate of a saving gospel and of all morality 
and social righteousness. It is of the essence of 
Christianity to send a man out after his fellows. 
The Christian who understands the meaning of his 
religion, therefore, will be a force for civic, com- 
mercial, social, and all other forms of righteous- 
ness. Thus Christianity in America will become the 
religion of the State, although not a State religion. 

The True Imitation of Christ. 

The true imitation of Christ consists not in ask- 
ing " What would Jesus do ? " merely, but in asking 
What would Jesus have us do? Christ cannot be 
copied. He is less a model for us than an arche- 
type. We may imitate but not copy him. To 
copy Christ would be to attempt to cure the blind 
by anointing his eyes with clay mixed with our own 
spittle. To imitate him is to devise measures legal 



208 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

and otherwise to relieve and to prevent blindness. 
To copy Christ is to attempt to feed the hungry 
thousands by a miraculous multiplication of loaves 
and fishes. To imitate Christ is to labor for equit- 
able social conditions, just laws, and equal privileges 
for men that they may earn their own bread. To 
imitate Christ is not to take sides with labor against 
capital or with capital against labor in the contest 
for rights, but rather to teach capital and labor to 
perform their respective duties. Christ did not deal 
directly with human rights, though no teacher ever 
did so much to establish them. He dealt with hu- 
man duties knowing that this was the point need- 
ing emphasis. Christ was not concerned so much 
with property as he was with persons. He valued 
men more than houses or lands. Our statute books 
exhibit their distance from him in nothing more 
than in their overweening regard for property along 
with slight consideration of life and person. Hun- 
dreds of people may be roasted in a theater fire or 
crushed to death in a collapsed building and the men 
guilty of the faulty and illegal construction go scot 
free on a legal technicality. But let injury to prop- 
erty take place and men are swept out of them- 
selves by moral indignation. 

We are disloyal to Christ so long as we regard 
the political or commercial world as a foreign 
country to the Christian. To think of it as under 
the curse of God is virtually to deliver it over to 
the dominion of Satan. Such a view, and it is by 



THE SOCIAL AXIOM 209 

no means uncommon, involves as its underlying 
philosophy the old Persian and Manichaean dual- 
ism of two contending forces equally powerful, one 
good and the other evil. 

Christ cannot be claimed as the special patron of 
any particular reform movement. The Socialists 
and Communists try to claim him, and so do the in- 
dividualists, and the anarchists, and revolutionaries 
of all kinds. But he is greater than they all. His 
cause absorbs all the truth in each of them. These 
little systems have their day and then they cease to 
be. They grow to maturity and flourish like the 
trees of a forest and then, dying, fall piecemeal to 
fertilize the soil below\ He is the sun which warms 
the soil in which lie slumbering the seeds of his 
kingdom and causes them to germinate and grow 
up to supply spiritual bread for mankind. 

Congregational Church Polity Best. 

The separation of Church and State is the condi- 
tion of the highest efficiency of the church in fit- 
ting men for social service. To be untrammeled by 
fetters which bind it to the intrigues and politics and 
to the varying fortunes of the State leaves the church 
free to render the State the highest possible service. 
Thus it may create spiritual character in men and 
women who in turn guide the destiny of the social 
order. The church is the dynamo whose task it is to 
charge all departments of life with righteousness. 

To fulfil this task the best form of church polity 
o 



210 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

is congregational. Local self-government is best 
adapted to produce the self-reliance and manhood 
needed in all the walks of life. Moreover it enables 
the church to escape from the snare of becom- 
ing a Church State, which is quite possible even 
when the theory of a State Church is repudiated. 
Roman Catholicism is a Church State. That is to 
say it is a highly organized and centralized piece 
of ecclesiastical machinery which absorbs a vast 
amount of energy, time, and money in government 
alone. The spiritual is always in danger of being 
swallowed up in the institutional. The work of 
making men righteous tends to become merged in 
the task of making them fit into their places in the 
ecclesiastical system. Indeed righteousness tends 
more and more to become formal and institutional 
instead of vital and real. The same remarks apply 
in a measure to all episcopal or centralized systems 
of church government. They are Church States, 
although in America not State Churches. To this 
extent they become rivals of the civil State and of 
the forces which make for righteousness in society at 
large, in that they absorb energy which should flow 
directly into these other channels. 

The best service which Christianity can render 
to society is to produce righteousness in individual 
character and at the same time set the man free as 
an agent of righteousness in society at large. To 
regenerate him and sanctify him and then put a 
heavy tax upon his time and energy in the adminis- 



THE SOCIAL AXIOM 211 

tration of the political life of the church is to call 
him away from his proper duties as a member of 
society. In short, other things being equal, the 
simpler the ecclesiastical machinery the better. The 
more completely the church's function is specialized 
in the direction of producing righteousness the more 
efficient does it become. The less complex the ma- 
chinery of the church the greater the opportunity 
for her sons to cast their lives and influence into the 
complex and manifold affairs of the State, and into 
all great movements for the moral and spiritual 
improvement of society. 



CHAPTER XIII 

BAPTISTS AND GENERAL ORGANIZATION. DEVELOPING 
AFTER OUR KIND 

We have now concluded our general exposition 
of the axioms of religion. It is in order next to 
apply them in several directions. One of the first 
of these is suggested by the conclusion of our last 
chapter. Baptists oppose the Church State as well 
as the State Church, the undue centralization of 
administration and authority as tending to absorb 
energy in illegitimate ways, as well as the union of 
Church and State. What then is the true theory of 
general organization for religious purposes? For 
no one will contest the proposition that co-operation 
for religious purposes on the part of individuals 
and churches and societies is highly desirable and 
fully in accord with the nature of Christianity, and 
not opposed to the teachings of the New Testament. 

Voluntary Principle Must Control. 

Now it will be entirely clear to the reader who has 
followed us thus far that the voluntary principle 
must control in all Baptist general organization, if we 
are to work out our destiny on logical lines and in 
accordance with providential indications. Our view 
of general organization grows directly out of our 
212 



BAPTISTS AND GENERAL ORGANIZATION 213 

fundamental assumption of the competency of the 
soul in religion under God, and three of the axioms, 
the religious, the ecclesiastical, and the moral. Di- 
rect access to God, equality of privilege in the 
church, and individual responsibility are the core of 
the Baptist view. We may expand these general 
conceptions into the following statements. The 
voluntary principle must control in missionary and 
other general organizations because — 

1. Religious authority is direct and not indirect. 
We have shown in a previous chapter that in 
human governments it is necessary to localize au- 
thority, from the nature of the case, and that in 
religion, on the contrary, from the nature of the 
case, the authority cannot be localized. 

2. There are no legislative or judicial functions 
left for general bodies to assume. The Scriptures 
are the rule of faith and practice, and discipline 
is remanded to the local church. 

3. The functions, therefore, of general organiza- 
tions are strictly limited. They have no ends to 
serve save those of eliciting, combining, and direct- 
ing the missionary, educational, or other forms of 
energy among the churches and smaller societies, 
for the advancement of the kingdom of God on 
earth. In short, they are simply means of co-opera- 
tion on an entirely voluntary basis. 

4. Most of the advantages of the centralized 
church governments can be attained thus without 
their abuses and shortcomings, and without the 



214 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

sacrifice of the Christian ideal at any point. There 
may be, and as a matter of fact is, a thoroughly 
graded series of missionary organizations under the 
Baptist polity. There is not a dead uniformity in 
the constitution of these bodies and the members 
are at liberty to modify these constitutions at pleas- 
ure. But the exigencies of the work and needs of 
the churches may be provided for at any time by 
suitable organizations. 

5. In consequence of the fact that Baptists exclude 
the principle of authority and rely upon the principle 
of voluntary co-operation, the course of general or- 
ganization has been with them an evolution accord- 
ing to changing conditions and in order to meet new 
problems of the enlarging work. There is flexi- 
bility and adaptability, therefore, along with expan- 
sive capacity rather than a rigid machine which 
may become a burden as well as generate power. 

6. The representative principle in the strict sense 
is excluded by our general position. If representa- 
tion is real it binds, and this is excluded by the 
religious and ecclesiastical axioms. It shifts general 
organization at once from a Baptist to a Presby- 
terian basis. The Baptist principle is that a church, 
or individual, or society, co-operates with a general 
body whose objects and aims it approves, not dele- 
gating authority in any sense, or binding itself 
beyond its expressed purpose, and always reserving 
the right of dissent or withdrawal at pleasure. 
The evils of delegated authority may be illustrated 



BAPTISTS AND GENERAL ORGANIZATION 21 5 

thus : Suppose seventy-five or eighty years ago 
when some of our smaller general bodies were being 
formed, a church committed to world-wide evangel- 
ization had delegated its authority to the general 
body and bound itself to its decisions, and upon the 
assembling of the latter the anti-missionary forces 
had been in the majority and voted the missionary 
enterprise down. This would of course raise the 
question of conscience and the missionary church 
and individual would have to face the question 
whether to obey God or man. Indeed, in Baptist 
history, more than once anti-missionary forces have 
been in the majority in district Associations and 
elsewhere. Chaos would have ensued under a sys- 
tem of delegated authority. Chaos did not ensue be- 
cause the voluntary principle allowed each party to 
go its own way and organize for its own purposes 
answerable to God alone. 

An Inevitable Result. 

The result is inevitable. Compulsory obedience 
to human authority in religion, where authority is 
necessarily direct and spiritual, always leads to 
collision and strife. The human authority to be of 
worth in religion must be assumed to be infallible 
and representative of God himself, or it ceases to 
be authority. Papal infallibility is the inevitable 
logic of all forms of religious authority. Thus there 
is an inherent contradiction in the idea of a central- 
ized church government. If God in Christ is the 



2l6 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

ultimate authority in religion, if the right of private 
interpretation of Scripture is an inalienable right 
of believers, if the Spirit of God illumines the mind 
of the individual, then to centralize church polity 
is to put a premium upon schism and strife on the 
one hand, or it is to deaden conscience and reduce 
Christianity to formalism on the other. For the 
awakened conscience will not tolerate legislation 
at the hands of men, and the occasions for col- 
lision will be as numerous as there are questions of 
conscience. Christian history abundantly justifies 
all these statements. Baptists have been a remark- 
ably united people in spite of their freedom and in- 
dividualism. There have been divisions of sentiment 
on various questions doctrinal or otherwise, but 
gradually the separated parts gravitate together 
again under the quiet influence of personal convic- 
tion and spiritual and intellectual growth. 

Plea for Centralized Church Polity. 

Occasionally a plea is made among us for a more 
centralized church polity. Looking at the apparent 
advantages of episcopacy and neglecting to consider 
its disadvantages, and forgetting that under all 
centralized systems there is a longing on the part 
of many for a more democratic polity, and that as 
a matter of fact there is an irresistible gravitation 
toward democracy in them all, some Baptist writer 
or speaker expresses a desire for a system where 
authority shall take the place of democracy. This 



BAPTISTS AND GENERAL ORGANIZATION 21? 

tendency is relatively so slight among us that the 
present writer does not anticipate that it will become 
a serious question. At the same time it may be well 
to glance briefly at the assumptions underlying the 
plea arrd at the results which would follow should 
we give serious heed to it. 

For one thing it assumes that the voluntary 
principle is a failure in religion. It proceeds upon 
the hypothesis that humanity cannot be made spirit- 
ual enough to be trusted to co-operate for spiritual 
ends. It rejects the idea that a regenerated and 
spiritual church-membership can ever be made fit 
for self-government in the general affairs of the 
kingdom of God. The demand for a centralized 
polity among Baptists also assumes that the principle 
of the doctrine of the competency of the soul in 
religion under God, and the axioms of religion 
which assert the equality of men before God and 
with each other, have only a theoretical and not a 
practical value ; and indeed that in this life working 
ideals are not practicable even in religion. This 
demand also involves the view that the one religious 
body which has consistently stood for a church- 
membership based upon spiritual character alone, 
reeinforced in its efforts by all the resources of mod- 
ern education and culture, in the form of public 
education as well as through its own institutions 
of learning, has not the power to create a coherent 
system of administration to secure certain practical 
ends, without invoking the antiquated theory that 



2l8 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

religious authority is indirect instead of direct. In 
short, this demand for a centralized authoritative 
system assumes that liberty and unity are irrecon- 
cilable ideas. It banishes liberty and equality in the 
name of unity, and assumes that while all the rest of 
the world in political theory, in art, in science, and 
in education, is gravitating irresistibly toward the 
doctrine of the competency of the soul under God, 
toward democracy and freedom, the one religious 
body which has made its history glorious through 
its advocacy of that doctrine, must now abandon it. 

Not Weary in Well-doing. 

Let Baptists be not weary in well-doing. Our 
inability to enlist all our people in all our work at 
all times is discouraging to a superficial view. If 
our ecclesiastical machinery could be so adjusted 
and oiled as to run without a jar it would doubt- 
less save trouble and please the esthetic faculty. 
But there is a profound reason why such adjust- 
ment can only come slowly: we are dealing with 
persons and not with things — with human wills, not 
with wood and iron. When you step into a great 
power plant you admire its smooth running. The 
ponderous machinery answers to a human ideal 
as the planets in their orbits answer to the will of 
God. But this is because a human will has im- 
pressed itself upon material things. When the ideal 
has been perfected in the mind of the constructor 
the rest is simply a question of mechanical execu- 



BAPTISTS AND GENERAL ORGANIZATION 2l() 

tion of details. But the process is far more complex 
in an orchestra. The players on the various instru- 
ments conquer each his individual harmony and 
his place in the general effect by slow and pains- 
taking effort under the direction of the leader. It 
requires much time and much patience and per- 
sistent practice after a high degree of proficiency 
has been reached to maintain a high standard of 
musical perfection. 

Now it is the ideal of the orchestra and not that 
of the machine which must control in religion. Not 
one human will stamping itself upon other human 
wills by authority, but Christ's will leading his 
people to the unity and harmony which will re- 
produce his own moral ideal. If art and science and 
education belong to the kingdom of the free spirit 
of man, so does religion under God. If science 
cannot be developed by authority, if art can only 
attain excellence through the free play of genius, 
if education in its fundamental ideals must con- 
form to the organic laws of the soul, so must 
religion unfold under the light and guidance of 
God's Spirit, and not through the repressive influ- 
ences of human authority. 

When God had finished his creation of living 
things he commanded each to reproduce " after his 
kind." Baptists may well give heed to that injunc- 
tion to-day. Our strength lies in our freedom and 
democracy. Herein lies our appeal to the universal 
heart of the race. We cannot mix episcopacy or 



220 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

presbyterianism with our democracy without an 
immense weakening of our hold upon humanity, 
loss of self-respect, and lowering of spiritual tone. 
We must develop " after our kind." If the way 
seem long and steep and if we grow weary from 
time to time, it is because the goal is high and spirit- 
ual — even the city that hath foundations whose 
builder and maker is God. 



CHAPTER XIV 

BAPTISTS AND CHRISTIAN UNION 

The Question of Christian Union. 

No question which has engaged the thought of 
religious men during the past generation has been 
more complex or difficult than that of Christian 
union The matter was brought to a practical 
issue in 1888 when the Church of England issued 
the famous Lambeth articles-a platform of union 
containing four planks. These articles were a 
slightly modified statement of the platform pro- 
mulgated just before by the Protestant Episcopal 
Church of the United States. The Lambeth articles 

are as follows : 

" (A) The Holy Scriptures of the Old and Mew 
Testaments, as containing all things necessary to 
salvation, and as being the rule and ultimate 
standard of faith. 

"(B) The Apostles' Creed as the Baptismal 
Symbol, and the Nicene Creed as the sufficient 
statement of the Christian faith. 

"(C) The Two Sacraments ordained by Christ 
Himself-Baptism and the Supper of the Lord- 
ministered with unfailing use of Christ s words 
of Institution, and of the elements ordained by 
Him. 



221 



222 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



"(D) The Historic Episcopate, locally adapted 
in the methods of its administration to the varying 
needs of the nations and peoples called of God into 
the Unity of His Church." 

These articles were discussed in pulpit and press 
to a greater or less extent in all parts of modern 
Christendom. But no serious movement toward or- 
ganic union followed. Attention was thus called 
to the subject afresh, however, and there has been a 
tendency toward union among some of the groups 
of religious bodies most closely related in doctrine 
and polity. There seems at present to be little senti- 
ment in favor of practical efforts toward organic 
union of all the Christian denominations. The 
agitation has served to bring into bold relief the 
obstacles, which are many and formidable. The 
principle of federation, however, has been invoked 
and a federation of most of the larger bodies has 
been effected. This federation ignores the ecclesias- 
tical issues entirely and seeks to unite all forces of 
righteousness in the various denominations on a 
common platform of civic, social, and moral reform. 

Christian Union in the Deeper Sense. 

The subject of Christian union in the deeper sense 
abides, however, and will doubtless abide until 
Christ's prayer for the unity of his people is fully 
answered. At least three points seem to have been 
gained by the discussion of the subject hitherto, and 
through the efforts toward practical Christian union. 



BAPTISTS AND CHRISTIAN UNION 223 

The first is that premature union is fraught with 
much peril as illustrated in the efforts of the Pres- 
byterians to reunite with their Cumberland brethren. 
The second is that Christian union cannot be made 
to order, but must come as a result of growth. The 
third is that there is a very deep and widespread 
conviction in the Christian world that somehow 
union will come in due time, that the present divided 
state of Christendom is not the ideal state, and that 
God is at work among his people with this end in 
view. 

The best service can be rendered to the cause of 
Christian union by a discussion not so much of 
programmes of union as of the principles of union. 
Real and radical Christian union, or to employ a 
word which is open to more or less objection, 
" organic " Christian union, as distinguished from 
the spirit of unity and co-operation, can never come 
as a permanent and abiding condition until it comes 
in obedience to the organic laws of Christianity. 
The most serious defects in the programmes of 
union have been that they have viewed Christianity 
as institution and organization first, and only sec- 
ondarily as spiritual law. The process must be 
reversed. 

A Serious Objection. 

The most serious objection to the Lambeth articles 
is that they include the historic episcopate. This ap- 
proaches the matter on the institutional side and sets 



224 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

up one form of church polity as essential. There 
would be no objection to this method of procedure, 
provided the historic episcopate could be shown to 
rest upon fundamental spiritual laws, primal Chris- 
tian convictions, or New Testament requirements. 
In short, no plea for an institutional basis of Chris- 
tian union can stand which does not show that the 
proposed institution is the outgrowth of the essential 
nature of Christianity itself. The unity of every 
living organism in the vegetable world, of every 
plant or flower, is the result of the co-operation of 
the elements of the atmosphere, the soil, and the sun- 
shine under the action of an inner life principle. 
That principle rejects every alien element and as- 
similates all that is needful. The institutions of 
Christianity must conform to its inner nature. The 
polity will answer to the life, and conserve those 
fundamental relations of the soul of man to God 
which constitute the core and essence of the New 
Testament revelation. 

We may approach the question as to the proper 
basis of Christian union in two ways. We may as- 
sume on the one hand that all church polities are 
equally valid, and on the other that some one is 
entitled to the claim to the exclusion of others? 

Consider briefly the first view. It asserts that the 
New Testament is indeterminate as to church organ- 
ization. That Christianity being a life-principle is 
subject to growth and development; that variety 
and not uniformity is the law of growth; and that 



BAPTISTS AND CHRISTIAN UNION 225 

the various Christian denominations as they exist 
to-day are simply examples of the freedom of the 
Spirit in the religious struggles of the race. This 
view must recognize as equally legitimate the de- 
mocracy of the congregational bodies and the au- 
tocracy of the Roman Catholic Church, as well as 
all the polities which lie between. Under this view 
a Baptist would feel bound to maintain his doctrine 
of the church, as would also the Presbyterian and 
others, on the ground that each is necessary to the 
expression of the variety and fulness of the life in 
Christ. 

It would become apparent at once, however, that 
" organic " union would be impossible. For the 
polities are incompatible with each other. Any 
authoritative source of unity which should embrace 
all the denominations would at once annul such 
polities as deny authority in this sense. Episcopacy 
in any form would nullify democracy, and any real 
democracy would cancel the episcopal principle. 
Federation would thus remain as the only mode of 
Christian union. The principle of federation is 
essentially the democratic principle. It recognizes 
the autonomy of each denomination, and declines 
to interfere with the ecclesiastical integrity of any 
religious body. 

The Principle of Federation. 

Now as a matter of fact Baptists achieve all their 
results in general organization on the principle of 
p 



2>26 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



federation — that is to say, on the voluntary principle. 
Only they carry that principle to the local congrega- 
tion and to the individual. It applies to all mission- 
ary and benevolent organizations whatever. When 
they co-operate for common ends they organize 
without any centralized authority. Those who join 
and those who withdraw from the organization do 
so at will. Not the principle of legal solidarity but 
that of voluntary unity is their principle. 

It is obvious, now, that if the principle of federa- 
tion alone is to be invoked to secure Christian union 
it can never achieve the result unless it is applied 
in a far more thoroughgoing manner than at pres- 
ent. For, while it may mitigate the evils of a divided 
Christendom at certain points it cannot abolish them. 
It may stimulate the system with a moral tonic but 
cannot eradicate the disease. For denominational 
rivalries will continue to exist. Doctrinal contro- 
versies will survive in one form or another. The 
waste of labor and money through the duplication 
of effort, so often complained of in our day, will 
continue. 

Our conclusion from the foregoing discussion, 
therefore, is that the theory that all the existing 
church polities are equally warranted by the New 
Testament or by the essential nature of Christianity, 
is false. It does not and cannot yield an answer to 
Christ's prayer that his people may all be one. Fed- 
eration of incongruous and contradictory systems 
is the best it can do. 



BAPTISTS AND CHRISTIAN UNION 227 

A Single Principle to be Found. 

We are forced, then, to the view that somewhere 
there must be found a single principle broad and 
flexible and energetic enough to answer the ecclesi- 
astical needs of the gospel. Where shall it be found ? 
The reply is that it must be found in the congrega- 
tional or Roman Catholic polity. The reason for 
the assertion is that these two alone are self-con- 
sistent. Those which lie between are dualistic, they 
seek to combine authority and democracy in a way 
which in time will surely fail. As intelligence and 
autonomy increase in these churches the authority 
will lose its hold; or if authority tighten its grip it 
will be because capacity for self-government wanes. 

Consider how embarrassing the case for Christian 
union becomes when it is discussed by the non- 
Roman and non-congregational bodies. We will 
suppose a Presbyterian is arguing the case with an 
Episcopalian. The logic of the Presbyterian is that 
representative church government is better than 
episcopal because it brings it nearer to the people. 
But this is Baptist logic stopping half-way. If it 
is good to bring the government of the church one 
step toward the people surely in due time it will 
be good to carry it all the way. The Episcopalian, 
on his side, urges episcopacy because centralized 
government is better than the non-centralized. But 
the Presbyterian at once replies that if the principle 
be sound Romanism is the logical outcome. In the 



228 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



one case, therefore, we have incipient Congrega- 
tionalism and in the other incipient Romanism. The 
reader does not need to be told, of course, where the 
sympathies of the writer lie as between these two 
polities. He is fully persuaded that the congrega- 
tional form of church polity is the predestined goal 
of development for all Christendom. It is not so 
much as a result of argument that men will be 
convinced and flock into the Baptist fold, or that 
any ready-made scheme of Christian union will win 
the universal approval. It is rather that by a sort 
of spiritual gravitation men will reach it- by a 
deeper apprehension of the New Testament they 
will .come to it. 

A Twofold Method. 

Having examined the two theories on which the 
subject of Christian unity may be approached we 
may now examine briefly the twofold method which 
has been applied in the past. One of these is the 
method of addition, the other the method of sub- 
traction. 

First we consider the method of addition. Some 
standard is set up which is regarded as the combi- 
nation of all the necessary elements in the ideal and 
others are asked to add to what they already have 
and thus attain to Christian union. This is the 
method of the Lambeth proposals as cited earlier 
in the chapter. The historic episcopate is to be in- 
corporated as an addition to all the other polities 



BAPTISTS AND CHRISTIAN UNION 229 

which seek union on the Lambeth platform. But 
this platform of union failed. It approached the 
matter in an unhistoric way. Change in church 
polity comes of growth, not by mechanical accretion. 
Besides its method is psychologically defective. 
Men do not find common standing-ground by the 
imposition of something new by one of the parties 
to the agreement upon the other. They seek out 
the things on which there is some measure of 
agreement already. 

This brings us to the second method, viz., the 
method of subtraction. This puts on one side the 
things which give offense, as far as possible, and 
seeks a common point of view. This is the usual 
mode of procedure in attempts at union of any 
kind. It is that which controls in the federation 
of the churches. There is not agreement in polity, 
but there is in certain doctrinal views and moral 
ends. Hence the latter alone are brought into the 
question. 

Now in applying the principle of subtraction 
in order to a common standing-ground for union, 
Baptists have stood apparently at a great disad- 
vantage although in reality their position is a very 
strong one. They have reduced the elements of 
church organization to the lowest possible terms, and 
hence, when urged to surrender this or that they see 
no way of doing so without striking a blow at their 
ecclesiastical integrity. Their church polity is the 
simple undeveloped polity of the New Testament. 



23O THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

They have the minimum of church government, 
Congregationalism; the minimum of office bearers, 
pastors or elders and deacons ; the minimum of or- 
dinances, baptism and the Lord's Supper ; the mini- 
mum of doctrinal tests for membership, not subscrip- 
tion to a creed but vital faith in Christ and the spirit 
of obedience to his commands as evidenced in the 
first instance by submission to baptism in the name 
of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. 

It is evident from the preceding that if the 
method of addition were the correct one in attaining 
Christian union Baptists would be in a position 
to add all the elements of episcopacy, and sacer- 
dotalism, the Methodistic principle, and the prin- 
ciple of authoritative representation, a series of 
graded courts and legislatures. But, as previously 
remarked, the enforced introduction of new planks 
into platforms of union is never the correct method, 
but rather the finding of a common standing-ground, 
or the method of subtraction. Now in the quest for 
this common standing-ground Baptists occupy a 
peculiarly advantageous position. For not one of 
the elements of their polity as enumerated above is 
without recognition throughout the evangelical 
world. Immersion is not the preferred mode of 
baptism, of course, in some denominations, but it is 
universally recognized as a valid mode, while 
sprinkling and pouring are not thus universally 
accepted. If we were to subtract anything from our 
Congregationalism in the matter of church govern- 



BAPTISTS AND CHRISTIAN UNION 23 1 

ment proper we would be without any church, organ- 
ization whatever. Moreover, Congregationalism is 
quite generally accepted as one legitimate form of 
church order. Baptists have, in short, carried the 
process of subtraction to the limit, or rather they 
have eschewed the tendency to incorporate new 
features into the simple New Testament polity which 
renders subtraction necessary. 

Baptists and Organic Union. 

It is at this point that we find an explanation of 
the fact that Baptists have not been particularly 
active as a rule in efforts toward organic Christian 
union. They are not indeed without profound in- 
terest in the matter. But being unable to surrender 
any element of their simple church order without 
fatally weakening it, and being unwilling to urge 
others to violate their consciences, they have await- 
ed the leading of Providence rather than sought to 
reorganize Christianity. 

There is, however, a still deeper reason for their 
attitude. The movement toward Christian union 
has, in their view, too often conceived Christianity 
primarily as an ecclesiasticism, whereas it is essen- 
tially a life involving certain relations to God 
through Christ. To secure a unity of Christendom 
under the aegis of the Church of England with its 
doctrine of the historic episcopate, or in any other 
external way would not necessarily add to the real 
spirituality or efficiency of the church. 



232 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

The plea of Baptists, therefore, is not a plea for 
" organic " union as the chief goal of endeavor at 
present, however desirable and important Christian 
union is in itself. Their plea is rather for the spirit- 
ual rights of mankind: the competency of the soul 
in religion under God, the equality of all men in 
direct dealing with God, the equal rights of be- 
lievers in the church, the principle of responsibility 
as growing out of the freedom of the soul. The 
axioms of religion lie at the heart of New Testa- 
ment Christianity. If the evangelical bodies which 
have added to their systems those elements which 
contravene the axioms and subvert the spiritual 
rights of the race, will discard them, Christian union 
will come of itself. We do not mean that all de- 
nominations will then come at once into the Baptist 
fold so far as external organizations are concerned. 
For the voluntary principle would leave them to 
organize as they might see fit. But it would secure 
unity of doctrine and polity. It would enable the 
entire evangelical world to present a united front 
against sacerdotalism and sacramentalism which 
violates the religious axiom, and against episcopacy 
which deprives the spiritual of their rights and 
privileges in the church, and against infant baptism 
which is out of harmony with the moral axiom. It 
would give to American Christianity the tremen- 
dous advantage of a simple, consistent, New Testa- 
ment church order in missionary endeavor in 
heathen lands. 



BAPTISTS AND CHRISTIAN UNION 233 



The axioms of religion, as expounded in previous 
chapters, enter vitally into the primal instincts of 
all men who have been under the guiding hand of 
Christ and who have been nurtured in New Testa- 
ment teaching. No effort or device for ecclesiastical 
or " organic " union can ever permanently succeed 
which ignores those instincts. We must learn to 
think God's thoughts after him as revealed in 
Christ if we are to find the clew to unity. The 
deeper currents of thought and life in the Christian 
world, the fundamental relations of the soul to God, 
must find embodiment in the final church order. 

Modern Life and Democracy. 

Now it is evident to the careful observer that the 
deeper tides of modern life are all setting toward 
democracy in Church and State. By an inevitable 
gravitation the world is being carried that way. 
The universe about us is a symbol of the spiritual 
order. It is a universe because it is one, a coherent 
system of interrelated parts. " He hangeth the stars 
upon nothing," and yet they keep to their courses 
and swing in their orbits. In the early stages of our 
solar system, doubtless much was chaotic and dis- 
orderly, as in modern Christendom. Conflicting 
tendencies, aberrations, comets, and nebulae, were 
features of that early universe. But had there ex- 
isted then an astronomer with insight and vision to 
discern the secret of the movements of that confused 
and chaotic world, he would have perceived the 



234 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

action of the one universal law of gravitation, bring- 
ing into being a cosmos instead of chaos. Even so 
in the modern spiritual world the deepest law of its 
total movement is that which is embodied in the 
competency of the soul in religion under God, the 
equality of men in direct approach to God and of 
believers in the church. This is the universal law of 
spiritual gravitation. If our moral and spiritual life 
is to become a " universe," a cosmos — an orderly and 
coherent kingdom — it will be through the action of 
this universal law of spiritual gravitation. 



CHAPTER XV 

INSTITUTIONAL AND ANTI-INSTITUTIONAL 
CHRISTIANITY 

A Churchless Christianity. 

There are two tendencies in our day which make 
for a churchless Christianity. Strange to say one of 
these is within while the other is without the church 
itself. We will note the latter first. Weary of the 
controversies over ritual and doctrine, of heresy 
trials and strife among the religious denominations, 
many men of fine moral character, especially in 
college and university life, eschew all church rela- 
tions and insist upon the sufficiency of the individ- 
ual in the culture of the spiritual life. These men 
see and appreciate the value of Christianity as a 
means of moral culture and seek thus to distil its 
essence from the outward forms and observances 
with which it has become involved. 

Professor Harnack in his " Essence of Christian- 
ity " has fostered this tendency in his eflfort to reduce 
Christianity to two or three essential elements. 
God's fatherhood and human brotherhood are the 
core of Christianity — the glowing heart within. All 
the rest is shell and needless wrapping. Scores of 
others cherish similiar views. Ecclesiastical Chris- 
tianity with these men is in bad repute. The sole 

2 35 



236 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



need is individual culture, a life " under the eye and 
in the strength of God." The revolt is in part 
against dogma as well as against church organiza- 
tion. For doctrinal formulae of some kind are held 
by all the churches. These men admire Christianity 
for its moral and esthetic value, but draw the line 
at creeds and church order. 

The second type of opinion which runs counter 
to the integrity of organized church life is found 
within the pale of the church itself, and usually 
among those religious bodies which have the least 
of church organization. Be it said, however, that in 
America this tendency inside the churches is so 
slight that as yet it has attracted little attention. In 
England and Australia it is more pronounced. It 
does not take the form of opposition to church organ- 
ization in so many words. It rather promulgates a 
view of the ordinances and the relation of the be- 
liever to these, which if consistently carried out 
would destroy the church. In England it takes the 
form of what is known as the theory of "open 
membership." It holds that baptism, while com- 
manded by Christ and binding upon all believers is 
not a condition of church-membership. Men should 
be received into the church solely because they sus- 
tain a personal relation to Christ— that is, faith in 
him as Redeemer and Lord. Their obedience to his 
command to be baptized is a private matter on 
which the church cannot sit in judgment, and as the 
spiritual is always above the formal, the vital above 



INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY 2tf 

the ceremonial, the question of baptism must be 
waived in all cases where the believing applicant for 
church-membership so desires. Naturally and nec- 
essarily therefore obedience to Christ in observ- 
ing the Lord's Supper would in no way enter into 
the question of church-membership. This too is 
private and personal. 

Thus the church is reduced to a society of the 
spiritual, held together through a common faith in 
Christ, but entirely destitute of ceremonials of any 
kind, and without any external badges to distinguish 
it from other organizations. Those who hold this 
view urge it on the ground that nowhere in the 
Scriptures is baptism specifically declared to be a 
prerequisite to church-membership and that, while 
both are required by Christ, disobedience to one does 
not necessarily carry with it disobedience to the 
other. This tends to dissolve the church entirely 
as we shall soon see. The practical energies of 
Christianity cannot be fruitfully guided without 
some external means of giving them distinctiveness 
and character. 

An Important Fact Overlooked. 

Now the brethren who adhere to this opinion over- 
look a very important fact. They do not take into 
account that the assumptions of Scripture are the 
most binding and fundamental of its contents. The 
thing everywhere taken for granted, and coming to 
light in an incidental manner only, or assumed in 



238 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



everything else is most likely to belong to the group 
of things never doubted and always understood by 
readers or hearers. A piece of music is pitched in a 
certain key, and while that particular note may not 
be sounded with frequency, it nevertheless dominates 
the whole performance. It is there as a sort of 
musical tether to control the range of sweet sounds. 
There is no express command by Christ to organ- 
ize churches, but only a declaration of his own pur- 
pose to build his church. In like manner baptism is 
not declared formally to be a condition of church- 
membership, but only as a duty universally binding 
upon penitent believers. Yet the apostles organ- 
ized churches wherever they preached, and without 
fail believers who became members were baptized. 
So that, just as the New Testament Scriptures 
everywhere assume the unity and omnipresence and 
omniscience of God without explicitly and formally 
announcing these truths but only in the most inci- 
dental way, so also the duty to organize churches 
and the requirement of baptism along with it, are 
everywhere assumed. In short, the " open member- 
ship " plea so far as it is based on the absence of an 
express command of Scripture regarding baptism 
and church-membership would on the same general 
ground abolish the church itself. 

Baptism Precedes Church-membership. 

That the writers of the New Testament do every- 
where assume that baptism precedes church-mem- 



INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY 239 



bership is easily made clear by a glance at a few 
passages. The Commission in Matt. 28 : 19 com- 
mands that disciples be made and that these be 
baptized. 1 Certainly discipleship and baptism are 
thus bound up together in a real relation, the latter 
being the fitting and required expression of the dis- 
ciple's attitude of obedience to Christ. As dis- 
cipleship, by consent of the advocates of " open mem- 
bership," is necessary to church-membership, so also 
baptism, the appropriate act of the disciple would 
thus naturally precede church-membership. In 
Gal. 3 : 27 we read, " For as many of you as 
were baptized into Christ did put on Christ." In 
Col. 2 : 12, where the apostle is addressing Chris- 
tians in their collective capacity as a church, 
he says of them, " Having been buried with him in 
baptism, wherein ye were also raised with him 
through faith in the working of God, who raised 
him from the dead." So also in 1 Cor. 12 : 13: 
" For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one 
body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether bond or 
free ; and were all made to drink of one Spirit." In 

*That part of the Commission which represents baptism as be- 
ing administered in the name of the Father Son, and Holy Sp rit 
has been called in question by some recent cr itics on the ^ ground 
that it is the only New Testament example of t^^^mg. tlse 
where the rule is baptism in the name of Christ. Eusebius, who has 
T habit of abbreviating his quotations, gives the Commission without 
connecting baptism with the Trinity, but only with .the name of 
Christ The textual evidence, however, is overwhelmingly in favor 
of the genuineness of the words. All the Greek manuscripts and 
extan? virions give them. The reader will observe that this 'criti- 
cal question is only indirectly involved in the above argument The 
Position maintained stands regardless of the critical point a t issue. 
Critical objection to the Commission as a whole rests on a foundation 
too slender to require discussion here. 



240 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

verse twenty-eight of the same chapter he dis- 
tinctly indicates that he is addressing the church 
and giving instructions for its guidance. Such 
passages might be multiplied. They do not contain 
a distinct declaration in a formal and explicit way 
that every believer must be baptized before uniting 
with the church. But underlying them all is this 
assumption. It was understood by all and disputed 
by none. And the things thus assumed enter into 
the warp and woof of New Testament experience, 
thought, and life. The process by which a crystal 
is formed in nature is determined by fixed laws. Its 
angles and faces come into being in a stated way. 
He would be a poor naturalist who should state the 
formula for the formation of crystals and ignore a 
part of the process uniformly present. The same 
principle applies to the formation of churches. 

To deny the necessity of baptism as a condition 
of church-membership because not explicitly com- 
manded requires that we also deny faith and re- 
pentance and regeneration as conditions. For 
nowhere are these explicitly commanded as condi- 
tions. They are everywhere assumed. In fact the 
" open membership " plea which rejects baptism as 
a condition of church-membership is a two-edged 
sword. It cuts both ways. It dissolves the church 
as the social expression of the life of the kingdom 
of God into an individual and subjective principle 
which leaves each man free to do as he wills. It 
plays directly into the hands of the men described 



INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY 24I 

at the opening of this chapter who repudiate the 
church entirely and hold that the individual is suf- 
ficient unto himself in spiritual culture. 

A False Assumption. 

The advocates of " open membership " not only- 
overlook a pervading assumption of the New Testa- 
ment. They introduce a false one of their own, 
viz., that baptism as a required condition of church- 
membership interferes in some way with Christian 
liberty. It is conceded by them that baptism is a 
binding obligation and that church-membership also 
is commanded. The making of one a condition of 
the other is what they deny and assert to be sub- 
versive of our liberty in Christ. But if so then to 
require any positive or ceremonial act of obedience 
subverts our liberty. If I should adjudge baptism 
worthless for my spiritual culture and church-mem- 
bership also valueless, as so many do, why am I 
adjudged disobedient if I refuse both? My liberty 
in Christ would be thus assailed. But it is replied 
these are commanded by Christ, and we must obey 
them. Are they? Where is there an express com- 
mand that all believers unite with the church? 
Moreover to require baptism as a condition of 
church-membership involves no infraction of the 
law of liberty in Christ not wrapped up also in the 
two commands to be baptized and to become church- 
members when these are taken separately. Let us 
not be deceived. Christian liberty is not in peril, 
Q 



242 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

nor even called in question here. Liberty easily 
runs into license. If the Scriptures join baptism 
and church-membership together uniformly it savors 
of license to attempt to separate them. 

Faith in Christ is urged by the advocates of " open 
membership " as the sole condition of union with the 
church, although they concede that for this they have 
no express statement of Scripture. But there are 
various degrees and grades of faith. To accept 
Christ as a great teacher does not imply necessarily 
that vital and saving faith is present. There are 
various degrees of historic and intellectual faith in 
Christ, and to make faith alone the condition of 
membership would be to leave the whole conception 
of faith misty and vague. Baptism safeguards this 
point in a remarkable manner in that it fixes the con- 
tents of faith. It has no meaning save as an act of 
personal obedience to Christ in which the essentials 
of vital and saving faith are symbolized. The 
frozen particles which enter into the formation of a 
snowflake are in themselves colorless and trans- 
parent like water or ordinary ice. The beauty of 
the snowflake comes as the result of the sunlight 
falling upon the frozen particles, imparting a 
heavenly whiteness which transfigures them. It is 
the truth symbolized which imparts its meaning and 
its beauty to baptism. From it is flashed back the 
saving message of the gospel. The ordinance keeps 
faith pure. It interprets religious experience to 
the obedient soul. It keeps faith directed toward 



INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY 243 

its proper object and in its true channel. Otherwise 
faith widens like some mountain stream as it de- 
scends toward the plain, leaving its proper channel, 
spreading in sluggish flow over a wide region, and 
finally disappears in the sand. 

Another Plea Urged. 

Another plea is urged in favor of " open member- 
ship " to the effect that to require baptism as a condi- 
tion of church-membership is to impose a condition 
for entrance into the church not required for en- 
trance into the kingdom of God. This has a plaus- 
ible look only. There are two possible replies. Some 
might urge that baptism is the ceremonial door into 
the kingdom, and the teaching in John 3 : 5 cited 
in proof. This would place entrance into church 
and kingdom on precisely the same basis on the 
ceremonial side. The New Testament does not con- 
template the presence in the kingdom of any who 
are unbaptized as the normal condition. The New 
Testament instances, as of the dying thief, are 
obviously exceptional and not normal cases. This 
would of course leave the question of spiritual 
qualifications for entrance into the kingdom unaf- 
fected. It would simply assert that the same cere- 
monial observance is placed at the entrance of both 
church and kingdom. 

The passage in John is not entirely clear, how- 
ever, and it cannot be asserted that the above answer 
has explicit New Testament warrant, although it 



244 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

will appeal to some minds strongly. There remains, 
however, another reply. Church and kingdom are 
not identical as we have sought to show in a pre- 
ceding chapter. The church has officers, the king- 
dom has not. The church is local, the kingdom is 
a comprehensive movement and power on earth. 
The church reproduces the spiritual elements of the 
kingdom, but as it has a specific task and a definite 
organization it is not at all proper to reduce them to 
the same terms as to organization and external form. 
The plea for " open membership " has taken yet 
another form. Let Baptists accept sprinkling as 
baptism. Let us insist on this mode or some mode, 
but let us accept anything as baptism which passes 
current in the Christian world. It is claimed that 
if we should adopt this position we would gain many 
members whom we cannot now receive, people who 
have been sprinkled and who belong properly in 
other denominations. Also, it would give a new 
sense of unity to the Christian world and bring 
Baptists into line with other bodies, and thus we 
would cease to be sectarian. Again, it would bring 
the note of reality into our life and take the em- 
phasis from the formal and ceremonial. Best of all 
it would assist Baptists where their power is wa- 
ning and where they appear to be leading a forlorn 
hope. In short it would lift us to a higher spiritual 
plane and enable us to realize our destiny. 1 

1 See " Shall We Go Forward? " a plea addressed to American 
Baptists for a larger conception of their mission. By Rev. E. F. 
Snell, West Newton, Mass. 



INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY 245 

This plea, however, will scarcely carry conviction 
to the Baptist family. Without doubt we would 
gain a member here and there whom we do not 
now receive; but there would be no urgent reason 
for them to join us if, as is alleged, we are to seek a 
common basis of church life with other denomina- 
tions. The plea for " open membership " in the full 
sense — that is for church-membership without bap- 
tism in any form, is a stronger one than this. For 
sprinkling as baptism destroys the meaning of the 
ordinance from the Baptist point of view. In the 
other case immersion is urged as the Scriptural 
form of baptism and insisted upon as a duty, but is 
not required as a condition of church-membership. 

The chief argument which is urged for accepting 
sprinkling, for extending our definition of baptism, 
is its effect in increasing our spiritual power and in 
imparting greater efficiency. This is a total mis- 
conception of the relation of spiritual causes to 
spiritual effects. It really assumes that baptism and 
questions regarding baptism are fundamental among 
spiritual causes and forces. We might modify our 
views of baptism and the Lord's Supper and church 
polity every decade with a view to increased spirit- 
ual power. But it would be without effect. The 
causes lie deeper. The announcement that all Bap- 
tist churches had decided to accept sprinkled per- 
sons as members would doubtless create a momen- 
tary excitement in the Christian world, but it would 
of itself bring no revival of religion. It would not 



246 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

increase one whit the force of our general appeal to 
men to accept Christ, but would rather weaken it. 
Where Baptist churches are inefficient they would 
remain inefficient. It is a very inadequate diagnosis 
of spiritual conditions which imagines that a sur- 
render of a clearly taught scriptural form of bap- 
tism in the interest of expediency and catholicity 
would rejuvenate the churches which have yielded 
to the secular and materialistic forces of the age to 
the serious injury of their spiritual life. It would be 
like trying to restore the falling timbers of a great 
building to their places by means of mucilage, or to 
bail out the water from a foundering ship with a 
teacup. 

Ceremonies have their proper place in religion 
as we shall see in a moment. They are of exceed- 
ing value in so far as they accurately express life 
and truth and for the specific ends with reference to 
which they were given. They do not produce life. 
The proposal to modify baptism or other of the ex- 
ternals of Christianity in the interest of convenience 
or expediency merely implies two radically defec- 
tive suppositions. The first is that in externals in 
ordinances and polity the church should modify its 
practice whenever expediency calls for it. To abol- 
ish entirely not only baptism but the Lord's Sup- 
per if necessary would be in direct line with the 
view. The externals of religion have rested on 
some kind of conviction, some sense of fitness and 
right hitherto, in all the Christian bodies. The pro- 



INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY 247 



posal we are considering removes the element of 
moral conviction entirely from our regard for the 
ordinances. The second implied presupposition in 
the proposal is that external forms which symbolize 
and express life merely can be converted into spirit- 
ual causes which produce life. The assumption is 
that by manipulating ordinances we can create 
spiritual changes and rejuvenate the church. Lurk- 
ing in this view are contradictory conceptions of 
the ordinances themselves : one that they are sacra- 
ments with life-giving power, the other that as they 
may be modified at will they have no binding power 
upon conscience at all. Among Baptists, who are 
anti-sacramental, the latter tendency would prevail 
in the end if encouraged generally, and what little 
of ecclesiastical order we have would soon be dis- 
solved entirely. 

Another Matter of Vital Importance. 

This leads to another matter of vital importance. 
Those who plead for " open membership " in our 
churches and those who cleave to the view that the 
church is needless, overlook alike a great teaching of 
history. They really raise the far-reaching question 
whether Christianity was or was not designed by its 
founder to be an institutional religion. They plant 
themselves on the platform that Christianity is anti- 
institutional. The " open membership " plea does this 
as well as the other view we are considering; be- 
cause for Baptists to exclude the two simple or- 



248 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

dinances from the essentials of church organization 
is to leave nothing, for them at least, from which an 
outward church organization can receive distinctive 
character. A flag is a slight thing, a mere badge or 
symbol. Yet a nation without a flag would be at a 
tremendous disadvantage in peace and war. The 
flag kindles the spirit of loyalty and enthusiasm in 
time of peace. In war an army without a flag would 
be in great measure helpless, a navy would be ex- 
posed to attack from friend and foe alike. A vol- 
untary assemblage of people claiming to be spiritual 
but with no outward badge or conditions of member- 
ship would soon lose its identity as a church and take 
its place with other human organizations maintained 
for moral purposes in a greater or less degree akin 
to those of the church. Infants might be received 
and enrolled, as in the " cradle roll " of Sunday- 
school. Inquirers and searchers after truth would 
like to enter the circle and environment of the spirit- 
ual, for obvious reasons, and with nothing to test 
or sift, with no external means of determining the 
real character of the applicant there is no reason to 
suppose that the church would not lose its character 
entirely. 

The fact is that no great historic force in the re- 
ligious or political life of the race has ever impressed 
the world profoundly or changed it radically without 
taking on institutional form. Christianity is not 
exempt from the law. The Quakers ignore the or- 
dinances. They are simply the assembly of the 



INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY 249 

spiritual. But Christ has grown dim in their Con- 
fessions of Faith and his is a waning figure in their 
experience. Unitarians also abjure the ordinances, 
but where have they shown power to grapple with 
the great practical and missionary movements for 
the spiritual regeneration of the race ? No great re- 
ligious body since the New Testament was written 
has ever attempted with any sort of success an anti- 
institutional form of Christianity. Great truths and 
ideals must have institutional embodiment if they 
are to become great historic forces. 

Vital Elements Symbolized. 

Now baptism and the Lord's Supper together 
symbolize all the vital elements in Christianity. 
Baptism accents the individual and the Supper the 
social aspect of the gospel. The life and creed of 
the church are reflected in them. The " open mem- 
bership " plea tears asunder this parallel between the 
life and the symbols of life. To remove the cere- 
monial barrier between the church and the world 
would mean in time the removal also of the spiritual 
barrier. The spiritual principles and ideals would 
become corrupted. The necessary proportion and 
symmetry of statement and emphasis would be lost, 
whole truths would become half-truths, vital and 
saving faith would become intellectual and historic 
faith, the church as a redemptive and militant 
spiritual force would become a social club with 
moral and esthetic ideals. 



250 the axioms of religion 

Church Not Mechanically Constructed. 

The New Testament church arose as the result 
of a vital process. It was not mechanically con- 
structed by Jesus through formal commands or 
through a statute book of legislative enactments 
after the manner of the tabernacle in the Old Testa- 
ment. The Spirit guided the early Christians. There 
were elements both formal and vital out of which the 
church was constructed. Baptism and the Supper 
and external organization were the formal, regen- 
erated life and social worship and effort were the 
vital. These elements were taken up one by one as 
the church advanced, by a sort of vital integration, 
like the cells of an organism. None of them are 
expressly prescribed as timber out of which to build 
the church. All are assumed. What we have in 
the New Testament therefore is a constructive spirit- 
ual process going on under our eyes. It is redeemed 
and regenerated life, under the guidance of God's 
Spirit, readjusting itself according to its own re- 
newed nature, saved men expressing the saving im- 
pulse in a practical way. The result is the church and 
its ordinances. Or, to put the same truth in slightly 
different language, it was the kingdom of God 
acting under a twofold impulse, that of redemptive 
love and that of self-preservation. The church is 
the device, so to speak, for the realization of both 
these ideals of the kingdom. The kingdom is like 
the current of electricity in the telegraph wire. The 



INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY 25 1 

church is like the instrument in the office where the 
current is localized, where the kingdom utters itself. 
The kingdom is like the sunlight traveling ninety 
million miles to this earth to brighten and to bless. 
The church answers to the flowers and fruits which 
the sunlight creates lest its long journey be made in 
vain. Lest the rays of the sun be utterly wasted 
nature must respond in concrete visible forms. Lest 
the energy of the kingdom come to naught churches 
must gather it up and reproduce it. The institu- 
tional idea of course, like every other, can be carried 
too far. Ordinances and forms may be multiplied 
and transformed into instruments of spiritual 
tyranny until a great hierarchy is created and 
Christianity loses its distinctive power as a spiritual 
religion. This is one extreme. 

Another Extreme. 

The other extreme is to discard all institu- 
tional forms. This leaves the community of 
believers, so to speak, gasping in a vacuum. They 
are thus left powerless to define their aims and 
purposes on the stage of history. They have 
no visible outline as an organized power and 
hence cannot challenge the attention of men. The 
Abbe Loisy says, " History knows of no instance 
of a religion without a cult, and consequently 
Christian ritual should cause no surprise. But one 
easily conceives that if the essence of Christianity is 
such as Harnack has defined, such a pure Christianity 



252 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

excludes all external forms of worship. That would 
be a peculiar religion designed for a legion of 
angels, of which every individual constitutes a sepa- 
rate species, and not of men destined to live together 
on earth." 1 To this we may add a statement from 
Sabatier, who is of course not in harmony with the 
Abbe Loisy on many questions, but who clearly 
recognizes the peril of mere individualism in religion 
and the rejection of all church life. He says : " The 
Protestant Christian who isolates himself, believing 
that he can draw all religious truth from the Bible 
for his individual inspiration, lives and thinks in un- 
reality. His intellectual obstinacy springs from ig- 
norance and keeps him in it. We have need one of 
another, quite as much from the point of view of 
the moral life as of material existence. . . Only in 
this social solidarity can the Christian life blossom 
out, and find at once health and security. An un- 
social Christianity is a stunted and sterile Christi- 
anity." 2 De Tocqueville has given a clear statement 
of the general principle : " I firmly believe in the 
necessity of forms, which fix the human mind in the 
contemplation of abstract truths, and stimulate its 
ardor in the pursuit of them, while they invigorate 
its powers of retaining them steadfastly. Nor do 
I suppose that it is possible to maintain a religion 
without external observances ; but on the other hand, 
I am persuaded that, in the ages upon which we 

3 " L'Evangile et L'Eglise" p. 121. 

2 " Religions of Authority and The Religion of the Spirit," pp. 
340, 341. 



INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY 253 

are entering it would be peculiarly dangerous to 
multiply them beyond measure; and that they 
ought rather to be limited to as much as is absolutely 
necessary to perpetuate the doctrine itself, which is 
the substance of religion of which the ritual is only 
the form. A religion which should become more 
minute, more peremptory, and more surcharged 
with small observances at a time in which men are 
becoming more equal, would soon find itself reduced 
to a band of fanatical zealots in the midst of an 
infidel people" * 

Discussion Summed Up. 

We may now sum up the substance of the preced- 
ing discussion thus : The advocates of the " open 
membership " idea in Baptist churches virtually rob 
Christianity of its only distinctive institutional 
features. Thus they join forces with the moral cul- 
turists who renounce the church entirely. This posi- 
tion is directly at variance with the New Testament 
which exhibits the kingdom of God expressing 
itself for purposes of conquest in the form of the 
church with its ordinances. It is at variance with 
practical wisdom which inevitably contrives instru- 
ments for the execution of distinct ends. It is op- 
posed to the consensus of Christendom which has 
for two thousand years recognized and insisted upon 
the necessary relations between the ordinances and 
the church. It violates the philosophy of history 

1 " Democracy in America," Vol. II, p. 26. 



254 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

which recognizes the necessary connection between 
triumphant ideas and institutions which embody 
them. 

Finally, we remark that while all the above is true, 
while institutions and ceremonies within limits are 
necessary to give distinctness and historic impres- 
siveness to any set of religious ideas destined to 
play a large part in the world's life, we must never- 
theless carefully distinguish between the causes and 
the outward expressions of religious life. We must 
seek to adjust the ceremonies and forms to the 
essential nature of the life and to its characteristic 
ideas, because this is the only stable adjustment 
which is possible. Congruity is the fundamental 
law of the relations between life and form. It is the 
law in nature as well as in poetry, in sculpture, in 
music, and all other art. In religion the law holds 
good. Ideas, spiritual forces, follow the law of con- 
gruity in the creation of ceremonies and in organ- 
ization. That is to say, the form expresses, em- 
bodies, or symbolizes the life; otherwise it has no 
function, serves no end. The New Testament obeys 
this law of congruity. So should we. We must not, 
on the other hand, commit the blunder of confound- 
ing ceremonial and symbolic expressions of life 
with the life-giving forces which lie in the back- 
ground of all forms and ceremonies. When we 
would rejuvenate our Christianity and bring the 
tides of spiritual life back again we must seek the 
eternal sources of life in the spiritual sphere. 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE CONTRIBUTION OF THE BAPTISTS TO AMERICAN 
CIVILIZATION x 

I read some years ago a book by Sir Walter 
Besant, entitled " Building the Empire," in which 
he sketches the development of the British empire. 
I was startled to observe that he excludes Ireland 
and India from the British empire and includes 
Australia, Canada, and the United States. But 
when I came to understand his point of view I was 
disposed to concede that in some sense of the word 
in his inclusion of the United States and his rejec- 
tion of the other countries he was correct. He 
meant that British ideas of liberty had come to 
fruitage in the United States. In this sense of the 
word we may regard American civilization as a 
Baptist empire, for at the basis of this government 
lies a great group of Baptist ideals. 

Civilization and Society. 

Civilization is the movement of human society 
under the influence of general ideas. As an ava- 
lanche is a movement of a mountain-side under the 
action of gravity, or as the tides are the move- 

1 An address delivered at the Baptist Convention of North 
America, held at Jamestown, Va., May, 1907. 

255 



256 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

ment of the sea under the attractive power of the 
moon, so civilization is the movement of the social 
organism under the sway of great general concep- 
tions. In the Dark Ages the chaos was due to the 
conflict of general ideas. Theocracy in the form of 
a papacy, aristocracy in the feudal system, democ- 
racy in the free cities, and monarchy in the rise of 
the centralized governments of Europe in turn tried 
their hand at guiding human destiny. All failed 
because no one principle or consistent set of prin- 
ciples gained the ascendency. Hence the dream of 
medieval Europe was unlike that of Joseph in the 
biblical story in which one sheaf of social ideals 
arose in the midst and the other sheaves stood 
around and did obeisance to it; it was rather a 
wild delirium of conflicting ideals in which the 
sleeper was dimly conscious of a coming day of 
better things, but had no clear conception of what 
it was to be. That day was ushered in by Martin 
Luther. 

The historian Hase says that since the Reforma- 
tion the movement of civilization has turned on the 
conflict between the Catholic and the Protestant 
principles; that is, the conflict between human 
authority and human freedom. A glance at history 
confirms this. The thirty years' war in Europe, the 
struggle of the Dutch Republic, the English Revolu- 
tion under Cromwell, the American Revolution, the 
tragedy of the French Revolution, and the conflict 
in modern Italy, as well as the current revolution 



BAPTISTS AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION 257 

in Russia, are all echoes of the deep cry of man for 
freedom, the rise of the sense of the inherent worth 
and the inalienable rights of man against tyranny. 
De Tocqueville has remarked that this same princi- 
ple is the fundamental issue in all American politics 
which finds expression in two tendencies — first, the 
tendency to extend and secondly, the tendency to 
limit the power of the people. 

A fundamental law of all civilization is that po- 
litical and religious life travel on parallel roads. 
They never diverge greatly in direction, so far as 
the great organizing principles are concerned. Re- 
ligion is the ultimate fact of man, and civilization 
is the dim reproduction of religion. Now my thesis 
at present is that the Baptists have furnished the 
sheaf of religious ideals around which the others 
have gathered and have done obeisance; that those 
ideals have imparted their peculiar glory to our tem- 
poral and political organization; that they have 
fallen from heaven on the hard forms of earthly 
power and glorified them, like a sunbeam dancing 
on the helmet of Achilles, or like the sunlight gild- 
ing and glorifying the darkened face of the moon 
until the latter shone with a power capable of guid- 
ing the benighted traveler to his destination. I do 
not of course claim that Baptists have a monopoly 
of these ideals, that in no sense have others advo- 
cated any of them. It is a question rather of de- 
grees, and what I maintain is that no other religious 
body has adequately set them forth, and that the 



258 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

Baptists have done so. The contribution of Bap- 
tists to American civilization may be stated under a 
fivefold classification. 

Baptists Interpreters of the Reformation. 

1. Baptists have been the only adequate in- 
terpreters of the Reformation. The advocates of 
any great movement in religion or politics may 
usually be divided into two classes — the practical 
men, the men of compromises and expedients on 
the one hand, and the idealists on the other, the 
men who in their practice carry out the logic of the 
movement to the utmost limit, tolerating no com- 
promises and scorning every tendency to temporize, 
and ready always to lay down their lives. Such 
were the Anabaptists of the Reformation, the ideal- 
ists who alone stood for all that the great movement 
signified. In the abandon of their devotion they 
did many extravagant things. When the Scrip- 
tures said, " Except ye be converted and become 
as little children ye cannot enter the kingdom of 
heaven," they proceeded to make mud pies and to 
ride stick horses. When the Scriptures said, " What 
ye hear in the ear in the inner chambers proclaim 
from the housetops," they mounted the roofs of the 
houses and preached to the passers-by. This was 
folly indeed, but also remarkable courage. 

Now Luther and Calvin and Zwingli suffered the 
Reformation ideal to pass into eclipse in large 
measure. In their adherence to the union of Church 



BAPTISTS AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION 259 

and State they repudiated the modern religio-civic 
axiom, " A free Church in a free State." In their 
retention of infant baptism they violated the re- 
ligious axiom that all souls have an equal right to 
direct access to God, and in principle repudiated 
their own doctrine of justification by faith and the 
right of private judgment in religion. Thus they 
introduced Romanism into Protestantism and per- 
petuated a double principle of religion, a double con- 
ception of salvation, a confusing and disastrous 
attempt to mingle the gold of the Reformation 
with the clay of medieval Christianity. The 
churches which retain infant baptism and Protestant 
countries which have religious establishments have 
never been able to cast off this burden. 

The Anabaptists in Germany and the Netherlands 
and their spiritual successors, the Baptists of Eng- 
land, from the beginning grasped the inner logic 
of the Reformation, and were from two to three 
hundred years in advance of others. That they did 
grasp the inner logic of the Reformation is seen ki 
many ways : in their assertion of the freedom of the 
individual and the autonomy of the local church 
under Christ for one thing. The Baptists declared 
for separation of Church and State in their earliest 
Confessions. The Presbyterians a few years ago 
demanded a revision of their doctrinal standards be- 
cause there was no sufficiently explicit teaching in 
them on the work of the Holy Spirit, or on world- 
wide missions. In the Baptist creeds of the early 



260 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

seventeenth century there are formal articles on 
both. 1 

The denominations generally, except Baptists, 
have been much perplexed over the salvation of in- 
fants dying in infancy, until recent years. Our 
Confession of 1660 contains a distinct article de- 
claring that all infants dying in infancy are saved. 
I quote Article 10, p. 112: " That all children dying 
in infancy, having not actually transgressed against 
the law of God in their own persons, are only sub- 
ject to the first death, which comes upon them by the 
first Adam, from whence they shall be all raised 
by the second Adam, and not that any one of them 
(dying in that estate) shall suffer for Adam's sin 
eternal punishment in hell (which is the second 
death), for of such is the kingdom of heaven, 1 
Cor. 15 : 22; Matt. 19 : 14; not daring to con- 
clude with that uncharitable opinion of others, who 
though they pleaded much for the bringing of chil- 
dren into the visible church here on earth by bap- 
tism, yet nevertheless, by their doctrine that Christ 
died but for some, shut a great part of them out of 

1 On missions note Article 34, Confession of 1656, of several 
churches of Christ in the County of Somerset, England, which says 
(p. 96 of "Confessions"): 

" That as it is an ordinance of Christ, so it is the duty of his 
church in his authority to send forth such brethren as are fitly 
gifted and qualified through the Spirit of Christ, to preach the 
gospel to the world." 

This article also quotes Acts 13 : 1-3 on the separation of Saul 
and Barnabas to the mission work, and Acts 11 : 22; 8 : 14. 

Note also Article 4, Confession of 1660 

On the Holy Spirit, Articles 18, 19, and 20, Confession of 1656, 
give an elaborate account of the work of the Holy Spirit, in all 
about four pages. Also Article 7, Confession of 1660, p. 3. Also 
Article 12, Confession of 1660, pp. 113, 127. 



BAPTISTS AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION 26l 

the kingdom of heaven forever." More on this 
point is contained in Article 44, Confession of 1678, 
p. 163. 

And so in other respects Baptists have embodied 
in their life the consistent working out of the great 
principles and ideals of the Reformation. 

Spiritual Interpretation of Christianity. 

2. Baptists have furnished to American civiliza- 
tion the most spiritual interpretation of Christianity 
the world has seen. 

This interpretation is seen in the following: We 
hold to believers' baptism because it prevents fic- 
titious naturalization in the kingdom of God; we 
reject the principle of vicarious faith involved in 
infant baptism because it is incompatible with the 
doctrine of justification by faith, and because added 
to that doctrine it introduces a spiritual bimetalism 
into the kingdom of God, or a gold and silver stan- 
dard of spiritual values, with a very bad grade of 
silver at that. We hold to a regenerated church-mem- 
bership because thus only can the church become 
a spiritual organism progressing by growth under 
God's Spirit, instead of a human mechanism pro- 
gressing by accretion under man's manipulation. 
We reject the sacramental conception of the Lord's 
Supper because the " real presence " of Christ is not 
a fact in the realm of matter but a fact in the realm 
of mind. We adhere to baptism by immersion alone 
because the thing signified is everything in external 



2'62 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

forms, and sprinkling or pouring destroys the thing 
signified in baptism. We hold to democratic polity 
and local self-government because we prefer to listen 
to God's voice as it speaks to us by his Spirit rather 
than to an echo of it in presbytery and synod, or an 
echo of an echo of it in a bench of bishops or an infal- 
lible pope. We prefer a polity which can always be 
made compact enough in general organization for 
spiritual work, but never compact enough for 
tyranny. We prefer a polity which is flexible enough 
in general organization for growth and adaptation 
to changing conditions to one which is forever tied 
hand and foot by corporate unity and legal soli- 
darity. We believe that a polity which can organize 
itself for general work without disturbing anybody's 
peace, and can, when its usefulness is ended, dissolve 
itself without a denominational cataclysm, is better 
than one that can do neither. 

Under Baptist polity you cannot organize the 
churches for any but good ends. You can organize 
them for missions and education, but not to try 
heretics or to impose creeds or to pass general laws. 
The Baptist polity has its shortcomings, doubtless, 
but it has unmatched advantages. It localizes dis- 
ease in the particular church and generalizes health 
through larger organization. All these things we 
derive from the New Testament which we accept 
as the only rule of faith and practice. 

Thus we make to American civilization our unique 
contribution, viz., an interpretation of Christianity 



BAPTISTS AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION 263 

in the highest degree spiritual, with the fewest of 
the carnal elements present. Thus we hold up to 
civilization in doctrine and polity the burnished 
mirror of New Testament Christianity, in which it 
may study its own image to advantage and discover 
the spiritual basis of American institutions. 

Baptists and Denominational Unity. 

3. Baptists have exhibited to American civiliza- 
tion the most striking example of denominational 
unity. 

There are three forms of power which enter into 
denominational unity. These are the capacity for 
integration, elimination, and propagation. By inte- 
gration I mean harmonious coherence of parts. 
Baptists have shown marked power of unity in this 
respect. In the years preceding the Civil War the 
various religious denominations in the United 
States, including the Baptists, were split asunder 
by the divisive issues connected with slavery. Of 
all those bodies the only one which has had the 
genius to overcome the resultant barriers and be- 
come reunited is the Baptist, and the American 
Baptist Convention is the living expression of Bap- 
tist leadership in the genius for denominational 
unity. The Methodists and Presbyterians have no 
corresponding organizations, and while Baptists 
will continue to do their mission work in Northern 
and Southern organizations for expediency's sake 
and efficiency's sake, they will nevertheless hence- 



264 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



forth exhibit in American life this organization 
which proclaims that our church polity never rules 
common sense and religion out of court in the 
adjustment or the readjustment of ecclesiastical re- 
lations. There is indeed an older organization 
than this which signalizes the Baptist genius for 
integration— the Baptist Young People's Union of 
America. 

Doctrinally our genius for integration has also 
been marked. There have always been extremists 
among us, and mischief-makers, but somehow the 
rule in railroad accidents has been reversed so that 
the trains on the curve of steadfast loyalty to Christ 
have escaped disaster, while those on the tangent 
have come to grief. We have two kinds of radicals 
among us to-day— the high church radicals who 
want to bind us hand and foot with the multiplica- 
tion of minute tests of fellowship, on the one hand, 
and the broad church radicals on the other, who are 
without doctrinal moorings of any kind. The high 
church radicals would give us a creed like the tight- 
fitting shoes and trousers and dress coat of a dude 
which forbid the free action of the limbs in any di- 
rection. The broad church radicals would give us 
a creed like the flowing robe of the Oriental, exactly 
adapted to the life of indolence and self-indulgence, 
but not for strenuous endeavor. The great mass of 
Baptists however will insist on a creed like the 
garments, not of a dude nor yet of the voluptuary, 
but like the habiliments of the athlete, which gird 



BAPTISTS AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION 265 

the body and protect it at every vital point but 
which leave it free for conquest. 

A Baptist Specialty. 

We have also shown capacity for elimination. 
This I may say is the Baptist specialty. There is no 
ecclesiastical machinery in which a church can be- 
come entangled and borne onward after life is 
extinct. Where are the hardshells? Some one has 
compared their former numbers and prosperity to 
a great plantation with fine crops and fences and 
other improvements. To-day there is nothing left 
of them but a solitary gate-post to which the curious 
traveler may hitch his horse while he surveys the 
scene of desolation. Where are the Two-Seed-in- 
the-Spirit-Predestinarian-Baptists? I hear there is 
a church or two of them left in Ohio. 

Not the least of the advantages of the Baptist 
polity is its facilities for burying the dead. The in- 
terment usually takes place with little ceremony and 
often with no flowers at all, but the operation is none 
the less effective for all that. The chief point is to 
get the corpse under ground. 

In the matter of propagation also there has been 
unity. We have adhered rigidly in our general 
work to the legitimate objects, missions and educa- 
tion. We have never been torn asunder by a con- 
troversy over creed revision or creed construction. 
We have never been rent in twain by the trial of a 
heretic in any ecclesiastical court. There have been 



266 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

heretics and heresies, of course, but they have not 
been dealt with by the denomination as a whole. 
There have been false cries of heresy also, but 
usually the agitators have become wiser and better 
men, or else they have been left as the voice of one 
crying in a wilderness and with diminished following 
and influence. 

Baptists and Liberty. 

4. Baptists gave to American civilization the com- 
plete idea of liberty. 

Mankind has pursued liberty over mountain and 
across valley, by land and by sea, through fire and 
through flood, since the first man caught a glimpse 
of liberty's white robes leading on to glory. The 
love of liberty is now a volcanic fire which breaks 
out into revolution and consumes and destroys the 
ancient fabrics of government, and now it is a tide 
of life which rolls across the face of nations, caus- 
ing them to burst into the beauty and fragrance 
of a new springtime. The spirit of liberty in its 
quest for the goal of its desire has sounded all the 
notes in the gamut of human experience, from the 
minor notes of abject despair to the ringing pean of 
victory over every foe. But liberty is a relative 
term. Some men employ it who do not know its 
essential meaning, because they have never looked 
into the face of the ideal itself. An ox under the 
yoke and groaning beneath the heavy burden has 
liberty — to switch his tail; and so has the Russian 



BAPTISTS AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION 267 



peasant to-day. A bird in its cage has liberty— to 
hop from the lower to the higher perch and back 
again; and if birds have piety doubtless some of 
them are duly grateful. But neither the one nor the 
other understands what freedom is. Cardinal Gib- 
bons has said: "A man enjoys religious liberty 
when he possesses the free right of worshiping God 
according to the dictates of a right conscience and 
of practising a form of religion most in accordance 
with his duties to God." Dr. John Pollard com- 
ments on this as follows: "In Cardinal Gibbons' 
definition of religious liberty is snugly wrapped up 
every religious persecution that ever raged in the 
world. In that definition is hidden away every fetter 
that ever galled the hands and feet of God's saints, 
every scourge that ever tore their flesh, and every 
rack that ever pulled their joints asunder. In that 
definition, as in a heap of ashes, lie sleeping embers 
enough to girdle the globe with martyr flames. I 
am unwilling to charge that when Cardinal Gibbons 
framed this definition he saw all these horrors hid- 
den away in it; but they are there, nevertheless." 
Our Anglo-Saxon forefathers knew no limit to 
personal liberty, except natural barriers like moun- 
tains, rivers, and oceans. But they knew little of 
ordered freedom under law. Our English ancestors 
who wrested Magna Charta from the hands of 
tyranny drank a deep draught from the exhilarating 
cup of constitutional freedom, but there were higher 
ranges of spiritual liberty unknown to them. Our 



268 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



New England ancestors drank deeply of the en- 
chanted cup when they came for conscience' sake to 
these inhospitable shores and " the sounding aisles 
of the dim woods rang with the anthems of the 
free." But they failed to grasp the idea that re- 
ligious liberty requires not only that we enjoy, but 
that we grant liberty to others. As Josh Billings 
or some one else remarked, "The Puritans came 
over to worship God according to the dictates of 
their own consciences and to keep other people from 
worshiping him according to the'r'n." 

Roger Williams and Religious Freedom. 

Now the coming of liberty to the world has been 
delayed so long because men did not know where to 
look for the fountain-head of liberty, or what is the 
rationale of liberty, the root from which all forms of 
it spring, until the Baptists taught it to the world. 
Religious freedom is the nursing mother of all 
freedom. Without it all other forms of it wither 
and die. The Baptists grasped the conception of 
liberty in its full-orbed glory from the beginning. 
This doctrine and those related to it shine in the 
early Baptist Confessions of Faith among contem- 
poraneous creeds like a constellation in the clear 
sky seen through a rift in the darkness of the 
surrounding clouds. It found its sublimest embodi- 
ment when Roger Williams took it in his hand as a 
precious seed and planted it in the soil of eastern 
New England, saying in the words of God's true 



BAPTISTS AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION 269 

prophet, " Out of this seed shall arise the most 
glorious commonwealth known to human history." * 
The same principle found heroic champions in our 
Virginia Baptist fathers, who gave neither sleep 
to their eyes nor slumber to their eyelids until the 
opposite idea was not only wiped off the statute 
book of Virginia, but the principle itself incorpo- 
rated in the first amendment to the American Con- 
stitution. 

Whitelaw Reid says the greatest fact of modern 
history was the rise of the American nation. He is 
mistaken. The greatest fact of modern history was 
the discovery of the idea of liberty, and that dis- 
covery was made by the Baptists. The discovery 
of this idea is the spiritual analogue to the discovery 
of the New World by Columbus and its emancipa- 
tion by Washington. I would like to see a heroic 
group in marble setting forth the facts. I would 
have a perfect image of liberty carved from the 
purest marble. I would have Columbus, the intrepid 
navigator and discoverer of the New World placing 
the pedestal in position, and George Washington, the 
dauntless soldier, lifting the statue into place, and 
Roger Williams robing the image in the garments 
of righteousness and placing the chaplet of divine 
approval upon its brow. And if the sculptor of that 

1 The purpose and limits of this work do not admit of discussion 
of the relative merits of Roger Williams and John Clarke in the 
founding of Rhode Island. ( The author appreciates the work of 
Clarke and in a historical discussion would emphasize it. But here 
and elsewhere in the book it is important only to call attention to 
Roger Williams as the great pioneer of religious liberty. 



270 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



image of liberty should look for her original pho- 
tograph in modern times, he would have to search 
until he found it written in the earliest Confessions 
of Faith of the Baptists and embodied in their 
church life and political creed. There is no other 
literature during or before the seventeenth century 
which portrays the perfect image. 

It was no accident that a Baptist wrote our na- 
tional anthem. The Baptist heart was the native 
place of liberty, and when S. F. Smith wrote 

My Country ! 'tis of thee, 
Sweet land of liberty, 

Of thee I sing; 
Land where my fathers died! 
Land of the pilgrim's pride! 
From every mountain side 

Let freedom ring! — 

it was but the natural union of faith in God on the 
part of the Baptist preacher joined to patriotism in 
an American citizen. It was but the deep spring of 
religious liberty bubbling up and over into thrilling 
song through the lips of a loyal citizen of this 
greatest country on earth. 

Spiritual Analogues. 

5- Baptists have furnished the spiritual analogues 
of our entire political system. They supply the 
moral and spiritual assumptions on which is reared 
our political fabric. Now there are two principles 
which sum up the political theory of the American 



BAPTISTS AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION 2JI 



commonwealth, and these are reducible to one, viz., 
the competency of the citizens to work out their 
political destiny. This applies to the individual, 
and is well expressed by De Tocqueville, as follows : 
* In the United States the sovereignty of the people 
is not an isolated doctrine, bearing no relation to 
the prevailing manners and ideas of the people; it 
may on the contrary be regarded as the last link of 
a chain of opinions which binds the whole Anglo- 
American world. That Providence has given to 
every human being the degree of reason necessary 
to direct himself in the affairs which interest him ex- 
clusively; such is the grand maxim on which civil 
and political society rests in the United States. The 
father of a family applies it to his children; the 
master to his servants ; the township to its officers ; 
the province to its townships ; the State to the prov- 
inces ; the union to the States ; and when extended to 
the nation it becomes the doctrine of the sovereignty 
of the people. ,, This is the political side of the fun- 
damental Baptist conception of the competency of 
the soul in religion under God. 

This principle of the competency of the citizen 
applies to the body of the people acting collectively, 
as well as to the individual. The town meeting is 
the corner-stone of our entire system. So the 
philosophic observers from a distance as well as our 
own best writers hold. Our fundamental concep- 
tion is not representative government, but direct 
government by the people. Representative govern- 



2'72 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

ment is an expedient made necessary simply by the 
increase of numbers and geographical extent. Pure 
democracy resorts to representation only when it is 
compelled to, and reverts to pure democracy when- 
ever possible. Now local church government as 
held by the Baptists is the religious and Christian 
analogue of the town meeting. It is not too much, 
perhaps, to say with due allowance for the figure of 
speech, that a local Baptist church is the town meet- 
ing of the kingdom of God, and the town meeting 
is the political church of the temporal common- 
wealth. 

Presbyterians seek to justify their system often 
on the plea that it conforms to the American system 
of representative government in having a graded 
system of courts and legislatures. But they forget 
a fundamental fact, viz., that in the kingdom of God 
the authority cannot be localized, while in the State 
it must be localized as soon as it assumes more than 
the dimensions of the town meeting. The authority 
of the State has to be localized and distributed be- 
cause it is a human authority. In the kingdom of 
God it cannot be localized in a series of courts or 
legislatures because the authority is divine and 
omnipresent. Christ alone is King in Zion. So that 
pure democracy in the church is the only true ana- 
logue to representative government in the State, 
because the latter is simply an expedient for regis- 
tering the will of the people. Representative gov- 
ernment is necessary in the State when the State 



BAPTISTS AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION 273 

becomes large enough to require distribution of 
authority; it is never necessary in the church be- 
cause the authority of Christ never can be localized 
or distributed. 

A New Testament Church and the 
American Government. 

Look into a New Testament church and then at 
the American government, and insight discovers 
that the latter is the projection of the shadow of 
the former. One might in a certain sense say that 
the primary election which determined whether or 
not there should be an American government was 
held two thousand years ago on the shores of the 
Mediterranean when the little Baptist democracies 
assembled to worship. 

I go further. Beginning with the religious com- 
petency of the soul under God as the distinctive 
significance of the Baptists in history, and passing 
to the civic competency of the citizen, we complete 
the analogy by showing that the six Baptist axioms 
of religion are the analogues of our political axioms. 
The theological axiom, " A holy and loving God has 
a right to be sovereign," has its counterpart in the 
recognition of God's sovereignty by this govern- 
ment in granting to the church the rights of an 
imperium in imperio; that is, in giving independence 
to the church. In so doing the State recognizes 
an authority higher than itself. 

The religious axiom, "All souls have an equal 
s 



274 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



right to direct access to God," finds its political 
counterpart in the American axiom, " All men are 
created free and equal." 

The ecclesiastical axiom that "All believers are 
entitled to equal privileges in the church," finds its 
political counterpart in the American axiom that 
ours is a government " of the people, for the people, 
and by the people." 

The moral axiom that " To be responsible, man 
must be free," finds its counterpart in the franchise 
and in all our American practice in legal and 
criminal procedure. 

The religio-civic axiom, " A free Church in a free 
State," has become naturalized in our speech until 
it is as much political as religious. 

The social axiom, " Love your neighbor as your- 
self," has its political counterpart in our political 
axiom, "Equal rights to all and special privileges 
to none." 

In short, the Baptist axioms of religion are like 
a stalactite descending from heaven to earth, formed 
by deposits from the water of life flowing out of the 
throne of God down to mankind, while our Ameri- 
can political society is the stalagmite with its base 
upon the earth rising to meet the stalactite and 
formed by deposits from the same life-giving 
stream. When the two shall meet, then heaven and 
earth will be joined together and the kingdom of 
God will have come among men. This is the process 
which runs through the ages. 



baptists and american civilization 275 

Baptist Bed-rock Ideals. 

In conclusion be it said that the intelligent Baptist 
can yield to none in his patriotism, for his religious 
ideals are the bed-rock of the political fabric. In- 
dulge me in a little fancy as we contemplate " old 
Glory," the name we have learned most to love to 
describe our flag. The stripes of continuous color 
across the flag tell of a homogeneous American life, 
and being equal in width they tell of justice and 
equality; and the red, white, and blue in the color 
scheme tell of American variety and of unity in va- 
riety; and the cluster of stars in the flag, each star 
separate from the other stars, tells of the principles 
of autonomy and individualism which underlie our 
whole system ; and they are stars to show that those 
principles of freedom were born in heaven, and that 
freedom and individualism are the freedom of an 
ordered universe, and not of chaos. 

We are approaching the Baptist age of the world, 
because we are approaching the age of the triumph 
of democracy. I seem to see dimly the outlines of 
that coming age. 

A solemn murmur in the soul 

Tells of an age to be, 
As travelers hear the ocean roll 

Before they view the sea. 

Like a vine growing in the darkness of some deep 
cavern, and slowly stretching itself toward the dim 
light shining in through the distant mouth of the 



2?6 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



cavern, so has humanity slowly crept along toward 
freedom. The mighty hordes of the Asiatic and the 
European world, weary and sad, yet courageous and 
resolute, are hasting forward with unresting feet 
toward the gates of destiny. Toward those gates 
these hundreds of years the Baptists have been point- 
ing, and to-day in the foremost files of time they lead 
the way. As humanity enters they will shout with 
the full knowledge that God in Christ has led all 
the way : 

Lift up your heads, O ye gates ; 

And be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors ; 

And the King of glory shall come in. 

Who is the King of glory? 

Jehovah strong and mighty, 

Jehovah mighty in battle. 

Lift up your heads, O ye gates; 

Yea, lift them up, ye everlasting doors; 

And the King of glory shall come in. 

Who is the King of glory? 

Jehovah of hosts, he is the King of glory. 

And the goal of human progress shall be realized 
in an eternal society wherein absolute democracy is 
joined to absolute monarchy, God the Father being 
the monarch and his people a vast family of free 
children. 



CHAPTER XVII 

BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 

I. The preceding chapter indicates the contribu- 
tion of Baptists to American civilization. This 
raises another question : Do the axioms of religion, 
as we have expounded them, contain in themselves 
sufficient virtue to guide the destinies of the race? 
Do we find in them the principia, or first principles 
of advancing civilization? Let us seek an answer to 
these questions. 

Guizot's Idea of Civilization. 

Guizot in his well-known history asserts that the 
idea of civilization contains the following elements : 
the idea of order and social well-being, the idea of 
progress, the development of man as an individual, 
and the growth of society as a whole. In his defi- 
nition he fails to give proper recognition to the fact 
that the core of all real progress is moral. He suc- 
ceeds better in doing this in his discussion than in his 
definition. Guizot's definition regards society some- 
what externally. It would be perhaps more fruit- 
ful to define it from within, to note it as a process 
in the spirit of man and society rather than in its 
outward appearance. As life is more interesting 

277 



2^8 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



than forms, and as potencies are more significant 
than attainments, so also is the inner law of civiliza- 
tion more valuable for study than its manifestations 
at any particular point in history. The flame is 
greater than the fagot. The genius of Raphael 
transcends the Sistine Madonna. The imagination 
of Michael Angelo is a more splendid thing than 
even his marble image of Moses. 

The star of the world's progressive civilization 
rose in the West centuries ago. The eyes of Europe 
rather than those of Asia were first permitted to 
gaze upon it. In India and China and other Oriental 
lands arrested development has held the peoples 
back for thousands of years. That civilization is 
well symbolized in the bound foot of the Chinese 
girl. Trammeled in its youth by some repressive 
principle it became club-footed at the outset and 
went mincing on its way. It could climb the long 
low slopes of the mountain of progress, but such 
feet could not scale the loftier heights. So it sat 
down after a short while on a low tableland and 
folded its hands. It has been sitting thus thousands 
of years. Western civilization itself did not assume 
definite form and outline until after the Reforma- 
tion. Its destiny was fixed, however, when the 
Apostle Paul crossed the Hellespont into Greece. 
Prior to the Reformation the conflict of ideals left 
the issue in the balances. After Luther the Western 
world was launched upon a new career. The prow 
of the ship points steadily to its goal and the shining 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 279 



shores appear, though perhaps as yet but dimly in 
the distance. 

The Significance of Personality. 

The key to this movement of civilization is to be 
found in the idea and in the significance of person- 
ality. The value of the soul of man, the rights and 
privileges of the individual, the capacity of man for 
growth and happiness, for the attainment of moral 
and spiritual character, for fellowship with other 
men and above all with God— these are some of the 
rich contents of the great word, human personality. 
The reader recognizes at once the echo in the above 
of the teaching of Jesus and of Paul as to the worth 
of the human soul, of the value of man as man. 
This is the pivot of modern civilization. The whole 
movement turns upon it. The revolt against tyranny 
and oppression in every form is but the expres- 
sion of it. In the political, industrial, and religious 
spheres every contest in which men are engaged to- 
day turns upon this idea. Two objects are sought 
for the individual man and for society, viz., that 
man may be free and self-legislative. He seeks con- 
stitutional freedom and moral progress. Liberty, 
equality, fraternity, are the great words which set 
forth the ideal as it pertains to society as a whole. 
The ideal of all forms of social life, as men are 
coming more and more to see, is that it is moral 
fellowship of persons. Business life should be so 
regarded as well as civic and political. These are 



280 the AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



associations of men and women for mutual helpful- 
ness and growth. Science, art, philosophy, philan- 
thropy, and religion are the higher regions in which 
the principle has play. 

Now in what follows we propose to show that the 
axioms of religion as previously expounded, taken 
with the general truth of the competency of the soul 
in religion under God, contain the essential elements 
of modern civilization and are fitted to guide it to 
the highest and best issues. We will view them first 
as a moral and religious force, and secondly as an 
intellectual, and thirdly as a social and political force. 
In all these spheres it will appear that the axioms 
of religion are the mainspring of civilization. Our 
sketch must needs be brief. Ground covered in 
previous chapters must here be assumed. An out- 
line of the salient points of the argument will pre- 
sent it sufficiently, we trust, to make good our plea. 
First we consider the axioms as a religious and 
moral force in the world's progress. 

Evangelism and the Soul's Competency. 

Evangelism, in the complete New Testament 
meaning of the word, is a striking illustration of the 
axiom and of the doctrine of the competency of 
the soul in religion under God. Evangelism is the 
proclamation to the soul of man that God has pro- 
vided a trysting-place, so to speak, for God and man 
in Christ. In Christ they meet, and face to face 
settle their controversy. The incarnation is God's 






BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 28 1 

self-revelation as a person, the atonement is his pro- 
vision for human sin. Evangelism is the approach 
of the divine to the human person. The high respect 
which God pays to human personality is seen in the 
fact that his transaction with every sinner in Christ 
is on the basis of that sinner's private and personal 
needs and conditions. Dr. H. C. Mabie, in his sug- 
gestive book on " Method in Soul Winning," touches 
the heart of true evangelism when he says the chief 
business of the soul-winner is to " put the sinner on 
the clew." The clew is always found in the sinner's 
own private experience, and Christ always meets 
him within the sphere of that experience. Where 
many paths converge upon a given point in a 
forest it is usually because a spring of water is 
to be found where they meet. The gospel is the 
fountain of life constructed with a path running 
to every man's dwelling. To put a man on the 
clew is to turn his feet into the path at his own door. 
Out of his subjective experience and sense of need 
he finds Christ. Evangelism connects the thirsty 
man with the fountain, puts him on the private path 
that leads to life. 

Now the bearing of this fact on infant baptism 
will be obvious to those who have read our preceding 
chapters on the religious and moral axioms. Infant 
baptism forestalls evangelism. Churches which 
practise it in a thoroughgoing manner and on a 
large scale have no place in their systems for New 
Testament evangelism. The Lutheran Church in 



282 



THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 



Germany is an example. The reason is clear. 
Spiritual thirst is impossible to the infant and water 
applied to its body is a vain substitute. Evangelism 
assumes the competency of the soul under God's 
grace. It assumes also the religious and moral 
axioms while infant baptism assumes none of these 
truths. 

Later in this chapter we shall see how profoundly 
New Testament evangelism, as sketched above, har- 
monizes with the best modern educational theory 
and the fundamental principles of psychology. 
Meantime we cite evangelism as an illustration of 
the axioms of religion as a moral and religious 
force in modern civilization. Evangelism is the 
method of God for setting the soul free. He regen- 
erates the spirit of man and thus transforms it into a 
regenerator of human society. Through evangelism, 
therefore, God grapples directly with man's deepest 
problem, emancipation from the power of sin. 

Evangelism and Modern Civilization. 

Evangelism is, therefore, a central force in all 
modern civilization, because the freedom which re- 
ligion gives is the only inclusive freedom. Indi- 
vidual freedom, freedom of thought, freedom of 
conscience, freedom of action, industrial freedom, 
civil liberty, these are all imperishable treasures of 
the human spirit, achieved as working principles, if 
not ideally attained as yet, at the cost of much blood 
and of age-long struggle. Yet ultimately they all 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 283 

rest on religious freedom. The free fellowship 
of man with God, implied in the doctrine of the 
competency of the soul in religion, and in the re- 
ligious axiom the right of men to direct access to 
God, is the ultimate basis of freedom. All forms 
of liberty are alike in the respect they pay to human 
personality; but they differ in the degree of their 
inclusiveness, like a series of concentric rings. The 
outside ring which alone can include all the rest is 
the soul's free intercourse with God. The ultimate 
authority for man is God. For God we were made. 
When adjusted to God through Christ we find 
liberty, and all other adjustments follow in due time. 
Democracy and its attendant blessings in the State 
in modern times has gone hand in hand not with 
sacramental and sacerdotal Christianity, but with the 
Christianity of free grace and the direct relation of 
the soul to God. The Dutch Republic, Scotland, 
England, America, not Russia, Spain, and Portugal, 
have made great progress toward government by the 
people. The regeneration of individuals through 
evangelism issues in church democracy, which we 
will now consider as a religious force in civilization. 

Three Important Witnesses. 

We have in previous chapters indicated the value 
of democracy in the church as the only possible ex- 
pression of the ecclesiastical axiom. But in order 
to make clear the general proposition that democracy 
in the church is fitted to guide civilization at all 



284 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

stages, if properly applied, we propose now to call to 
the stand three witnesses widely separated in some 
respects from each other. They bear testimony to 
the value of a democratic church with reference to 
widely separated aspects of Christian effort and 
progress. 

The first will be Mr. Loring Brace who has writ- 
ten powerfully in defense of the Christian faith in 
his well-known work " Gesta Christi." Says Mr. 
Brace: "The union of the Christian Church with 
the State under Constantine we regard as one of the 
great blunders of the historical church, which has 
drawn after it a long train of evils, whose effects 
are even yet experienced. Could Christianity have 
been permitted to grow, as it did under the apostles, 
in little voluntary associations of believers, uncon- 
nected with the civil power and with a simple organ- 
ization, we should not have had, indeed, the grand 
spectacle of an apparently converted imperial court, 
and an official hierarchy, and a church supported by 
armies and governed by warriors, courtiers, and 
vast populations suddenly made into nominal Chris- 
tians — but we should have been saved a paganized 
peasantry, a corrupt priesthood, a hierarchy full of 
greed and ambition, ages of blood and religious war- 
fare, and a church which persecuted both science 
and differing opinions. The Christian faith would 
have grown up where it belongs — in quiet, humble 
places — and have reformed manners and morals be- 
fore it took hold of legislation. Christ's principles 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 285 

would have been a spiritual power in the world, not 
a form or an institution, and would thus have finally 
permeated society. So far from regarding the 
spread of the Christian religion in the Roman world 
as a sign of its divine origin and evidence of its tri- 
umph, we consider it as almost a fatal occurrence, 
and as having impeded the spread of Christ's real 
truth ever since" * 

Those who regard the medieval Church of Rome 
as the great providential agency for preserving civil- 
ization from chaos will of course reject Mr Brace's 
view. But if they will recall the character of the 
New Testament church, as made up of the regener- 
ate alone, and not of those baptized in infancy ; and 
if they will recall the tremendous spiritual energy 
of the early church as shown in its speedy conquest 
of the empire in spite of fearful persecutions, the 
force of the language of Mr. Brace will be felt. 

Professor Harnack's Testimony. 

Let us next take Professor Adolf Harnack as a 
witness. In an essay published a few years ago en- 
titled " Thoughts on Protestantism," he arraigns the 
established churches of Europe in a severe manner, 
and points out the perils which confront them. 
He is of course not a member of a congregational 
or Baptist church, but throughout his essay he in- 
sists on principles which lie at the heart of church 
democracy, and the axioms of religion supply the 

1 " Gesta Christi," pp. 51, 52. 



286 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

fundamental conceptions of his general plea for a 
more spiritual and more biblical Christianity than 
that found in the State Churches. The great peril 
to which he calls especial attention is " the progres- 
sive Catholicizing of the Protestant churches!' He 
means by this that these State Churches are more 
and more becoming centralized and secularized, that 
sacerdotalism is creeping in, that tradition is acquir- 
ing, in increasing measure, a binding force. Men 
are forgetting the real nature of the church as a 
congregation of believers, a spiritual body owing 
the first allegiance to Christ and guided by the 
Spirit. 

Professor Harnack, in proving the existence of 
Catholicizing tendency says : " The first thing to 
notice relates to the very conception of a church. 
What we in Germany call the evangelical conception 
of a church has almost vanished ; and if any one in 
practical life ventures to remind people of it he is 
cried down as an impractical dreamer. The ma- 
jority of our influential clerical newspapers, with 
which must also be reckoned one or two political 
journals, go to work with ideas which are quite 
Catholic. One of these church newspapers I have 
been reading regularly now for several years and in 
all its countless references to the church I cannot 
remember ever to have come across a single passage 
in which full justice is done to the seventh article of 
the Augsburg Confession. . . Hardly any distinc- 
tion is drawn between the Church of the Faith and 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 287 

the National Church ; and all the decisions and regu- 
lations of the National Church, so far as they are 
agreeable to the greater number, are placed under 
the protection of the sacred authority. " * 

We insert at this point the seventh article of the 
Augsburg Confession referred to by Professor 
Harnack. The reader will be interested to observe 
its contrast with the modern developed and central- 
ized hierarchies. The article is as follows : " Also 
they teach that one holy church is to continue for- 
ever. But the church is the congregation of saints, 
in which the gospel is rightly taught and the sacra- 
ments rightly administered. And unto the true 
unity of the church it is sufficient to agree concern- 
ing the doctrine of the gospel and the administra- 
tion of the sacraments. Nor is it necessary that 
human traditions, rites, or ceremonies instituted by 
men should be alike everywhere, as St. Paul saith : 
6 There is one faith, one baptism, one God and 
Father of all.' " 2 

Again Harnack says : " Added to this Catholic 
conception of the church, which identifies the Church 
of the Faith with the Church of History, we evan- 
gelicals are also gradually experiencing everything 
that naturally goes with it — fanaticism, the despotic 
tendency, impatience, a mania for persecution, 
clerical uniform, and clerical police. " 3 He remarks 
in closing this division of his discussion that " a clear 

1 " Thoughts on Protestantism," pp. 32, 33. 

2 Schaff's "Creeds of Christendom," Vol. Ill, pp. 11, 12. 
8 " Thoughts on Protestantism," p. 35. 



288 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

insight into the conditions of Protestant life is on 
the point of disappearing " and that unless some- 
thing is done it will disappear entirely. He quotes 
a description of the Roman Catholic Church in 
France by an intelligent French Catholic in which 
France is described as the most " orthodox country 
in the world because in matters of religion the most 
indifferent." Catholicism is declared to be full of 
myths, superstitions, and absurdities; and on the 
other hand, full of profound ideas, significant ritual, 
and flourishing symbolism. Church authority, not 
investigation settles all questions. No one is ex- 
pected to understand or believe the system. There 
are no doubts because there is no thought. The 
believer may be in the church but also the unbeliever, 
for he is undisturbed so long as he conforms to the 
outward requirements. Professor Harnack then 
adds : " The image of Catholicism which is here 
portrayed is the image that threatens us." Again, 
" If the development insensibly advances, and we 
simply capitulate to it a second Catholicism will be 
formed out of the consolidation of Protestantism; 
but it will be poorer and of less religious intensity 
than the first." * 

What remedy does Professor Harnack propose? 
This: that fresh emphasis be given to two vital 
truths of original Christianity. The first is that " in 
the end religion is only a steadfast temper of the 
soul, rooted in childlike trust in God." The second 

1 " Thoughts on Protestantism," p. 51. 






BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 289 

truth is " That this childlike trust is inseparably 
bound up with the plain simple rule that the moral 
life, in all its solemnity and earnestness, is the cor- 
relative of religion, and that without it religion be- 
comes idolatry and a deception of the soul. ,, x In his 
protest against the institutionalism which he cannot 
resist successfully Harnack urges in particular the 
need of " independent personalities. " He says 
" Truly it is not uniform institutions that our age 
demands, but personalities of the most various type 
— wide-awake, rounded, free/' 2 

Thus Harnack on the European churches. It is 
a severe indictment. It points clearly to one of our 
chief contentions in preceding chapters, viz., that 
democracy in the church above all polities, and in- 
deed alone among the various polities, safeguards the 
spiritual rights of the soul. Man loses his spiritual 
birthright in due time when he commits his religious 
interests to human authorities and centralized insti- 
tutions, when he adopts the indirect instead of the 
direct method of dealing with God. The axioms 
of religion would solve the religious problems of 
Europe if consistently applied. Free thought in 
France is fundamentally anti-clerical rather than 
anti-Christian. If the Christian religion could be set 
before the eyes of unbelief in European countries in 
its original, simple, universal elements, thousands of 
men and women thirsting for the truth would hail 
it as famished pilgrims crossing a desert hail the 

1 " Thoughts on Protestantism," p. 55. 2 Ibid., p. 63. 

T 



29O THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

oasis with crystal fountain and spreading trees. A 
significant fact is that in the State Churches in both 
Germany and England there is a distinct inner 
movement toward a deeper spirituality. In England 
the Keswick movement offers a haven for the dis- 
satisfied and spiritually hungry. On the Continent 
and in England this spiritual movement from within 
is regarded by the constituted authorities as an alien 
element and disturbing force. Thus the freedom of 
the spirit ever struggles for existence in bodies 
where the practice of infant baptism obscures or 
nullifies conversion, and where centralized power 
suppresses democracy. 

Foreign Missions and the Churches. 

The progress of foreign missions is a matter of 
vital moment to the churches of Jesus Christ. Presi- 
dent C. C. Hall in his recent work, " The Universal 
Elements of the Christian Religion/' has discussed 
the question of church organization and of foreign 
missions in a suggestive and fruitful way. He does 
not commit himself to the idea of democracy in the 
church in any formal way. But his entire plea looks 
in that direction. 

Referring to the church troubles in Scotland due 
to " technicalities in a trust deed given sixty years 
ago," and to the pending struggle of the Noncon- 
formists of England against the Education Bill 
Doctor Hall says : " Assuredly the ongoing of truth 
is not to be holden by parliamentary decisions. God 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 2<}I 

may have in his plan not the disestablishment of 
the Church of England only, but that larger dis- 
establishment of the whole sectarian principle which 
implies reorganization on simpler lines of service 
with faith and love." x 

Denominationalism and Missions. 

Coming then to the discussion of denominational- 
ism in relation to missions Doctor Hall declares that 
it is not expedient to attempt to perpetuate the vari- 
ous forms of modern Protestantism on the mission 
fields of the East. It is confusing and disastrous. He 
pleads rather for some simpler form of Christianity 
which contains only its universal elements as these 
lay in the mind of Christ. Such a form would 
allow scope for the unfolding of the spiritual life of 
China and Japan and India according to its own 
needs and conditions. It is wrong to compel the 
East to wear the highly developed ecclesiastical 
armor of the West. 

President Hall says : " It is vain to make a cal- 
culation of the number of those for whom the 
denominational aspects of the church are already 
dim, as the outlines of a receding coast, and on the 
horizon line of whose hope is rising the image of a 
more glorious and homogeneous church, not having 
spot or wrinkle or any such thing; a church of the 
living God, the pillar and ground of the truth, built 
upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Je- 

1 " Universal Elements of the Christian Religion/* p. 94« 



292 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

sus Christ himself being the chief Corner-stone." l 
Again, he says whatever form the new interpretation 
of the church may take, it " can crystallize around 
one axis only — the Cross of the Redeemer. Give 
that and all else is given. Give that and all are one 
in him. This crystallizing of unorganized sentiment 
into a reinterpretation of the church on non-sec- 
tarian lines would be, not a new ecclesiastical unity 
— not a new dogmatic unity — that were but to im- 
pose a new Catholicism, to revive the dream of an 
external seat of human authority, to give the stone 
of death for the bread of life. The next great 
reinterpretation of the church must be through the 
centralizing power of the Eternal Truth lifted up 
and drawing men unto itself, with the vitalizing 
power of the Eternal Spirit giving liberty unto every 
man. Through such a church the Christianization 
of the world becomes possible, if not immediate. 
The witness of such a church would be an irresist- 
ible witness. The effect of such a church would be 
the advent and fruition of the kingdom of God." 2 

The writer has no desire, of course, to construe 
the language of another in a way which its author 
would repudiate. Nor does he wish to ascribe to 
President Hall views identical with his own as to the 
essential elements of Christianity. But the careful 
reader will discern very clearly in the preceding sen- 
tences of Doctor Hall the substance of the " Axioms 

1 " Universal Elements of the Christian Religion," p. 97. 

2 Ibid., pp. 98, 99. 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 293 

of Religion " as set forth in this volume : The soul's 
direct relation to God's Spirit, the union of believers 
in the truth, the equality of men before God, the 
central position of the cross of Christ in human 
redemption, and the competency of the soul in 
religion under God. 

Christian Union and the Voluntary 
Principle. 

It should be noted here that modern progress 
toward Christian union is shut up to the voluntary 
principle as the only pathway toward the goal. 
There is no way in which a law of unity can be 
imposed from without. It can therefore find ex- 
pression only through an inward movement which is 
free and voluntary. Systems therefore, which are 
based on authority are prevented by virtue of that 
fact from supplying the principle of union, unless 
it be supposed that the free bodies will, with grow- 
ing intelligence and spirituality, choose to assume 
a yoke of ecclesiastical authority. This is scarcely 
conceivable. Birds which have been confined in 
cages may, through force of habit, fly back into them 
after being released ; but the birds which never knew 
anything but God's free atmosphere and overarching 
heavens will scarcely fold their wings and hop into 
a prison. Revolutions, religious as well as political, 
never go backwards. The planet in the solar system 
may be tilted more or less on its axis, and it may 
vary somewhat in its distance from the sun, but it 



294 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

never reverses the direction of its rotation. The 
swing of the spiritual movement is away from 
human authority in religion, not toward it. 

The axioms of religion do not require external 
uniformity in the mechanical sense. " Organic " 
church union is not necessary to union in Christ. 
Every other body might become Baptist in doctrine 
and polity and, if it saw fit, remain distinct from the 
present Baptist denomination in organized effort. 
Baptist principles require the utmost freedom in 
these things. This point is emphasized here to show 
that the writer is not dealing with the subject of 
Christian union in a merely sectarian spirit, with a 
desire merely to have others " come over and join 
us." If bodies of Christians can find sufficient 
grounds for separate organizations for general mis- 
sionary and benevolent purposes, Baptists have no 
word of objection, only let them restore to humanity 
their spiritual rights under God, as Christ and his 
apostles have revealed them to us. 

The Axioms of Religion as a Religious 
Force. 

To sum up now this section of our discussion we 
assert that as a religious force in the progress of the 
race the axioms of religion are of incalculable value 
first, because all forms of human freedom are ulti- 
mately grounded in religious freedom. Evangelism 
or its equivalent in religious instruction is the usual 
method by which religious freedom in the deepest, 






BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 295 

truest sense is achieved for individual souls, and the 
method through which the emancipating power of 
religion becomes active and potent in human society ; 
and evangelism is a concrete expression of the 
principles of the axioms at a particular point. 

These statements admit other ways of bringing 
saving truth to the soul, as well as all forms of 
Christian nurture. Evangelism is simply the most 
convenient illustration of the principle. Secondly, 
the value of the axioms is further seen in that, ac- 
cording to Mr. Brace, their loss from early Chris- 
tianity robbed the church of its power as a great 
social force; their loss from modern European 
Christianity, according to Harnack, imperils those 
spiritual rights of man against the loss of which he 
so vigorously protests ; and their presence alone, ac- 
cording to President Hall, will impart the sim- 
plicity and homogeneity necessary in propagating 
Christianity in the Orient. Thirdly, the voluntary 
principle underlying the axioms at every point, in 
the nature of the case, is the chief dependence in 
efforts for Christian union. 

Intellectual Force and Axioms of Religion. 

2. We next consider the axioms of religion as an 
intellectual force in world progress. Here it will 
be sufficient to note their relation to three intellectual 
movements, modern educational theory, modern 
science, and modern philosophy. 

First, modern pedagogy and educational theory. 



296 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

A brief sketch of the progress of the principles of 
pedagogy through history will aid us in realizing 
the truth. Prof. Paul Monroe in his " Text-book in 
the History of Education " has given an excellent 
outline. A chief virtue in his manner of pre- 
sentation lies in the fact that he relates educa- 
tional method everywhere to the development of 
personality. 

Among the Chinese we find one of the most prim- 
itive forms of education. As Professor Monroe says, 
Chinese education is education by "recapitulation." 
The pupil simply memorizes the details of Chinese 
life and literature. Charles Lamb's humorous essay 
on the origin of roast pig suggests the method of 
Chinese education. A Chinaman upon returning 
home found his house burned and his pig dead and 
roasted to a brown. By accident his son burnt his 
finger on the roasted pig and put it in his mouth for 
relief. Thus he discovered the savory qualities of 
roast pig. Henceforth when this article of food was 
desired the Chinese method was to shut up the pig 
in the dwelling and burn the latter to the ground. 
In other words, the Chinese pupil is a slavish copy- 
ist. Here, of course, is no play for personality. 
Originality is at a discount. Repression and sup- 
pression of individuality rule in all effort. 

As contrasted with that of the Chinese, Greek 
education was " progressive adjustment," a vast ad- 
vance upon the Chinese. Here personality and indi- 
viduality come into view in some measure at least. 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 297 

The principle of growth is recognized. The adjust- 
ment sought was progressive, it was an adjustment 
to the world of practical life and the world of 
thought. Greek education aimed to make a man a 
free citizen. But it too came far short. It was 
aristocratic. Women and slaves were left out of the 
account. So also was the future life. The soul for 
its own sake, the worth of man as man they did not 
appreciate. 

Roman education was similar to the Chinese in 
that it had chiefly the aim of equipping the boy for 
practical life. The Roman boy must also imitate, 
copy, gather up in himself what the past knew and 
especially what it did. The models for imitation 
were higher than among the Chinese, but in- 
itiative was wanting here also. Individuality was 
suppressed. 

In the Middle Ages and in modern times educa- 
tion was regarded chiefly as discipline. To drill the 
mind, give it bone and sinew, so to speak, and make 
it capable, this has been the aim. The preferences of 
the child, his aptitudes, and individual disposition 
or genius, were ignored. The practical value of the 
study, its immediate utility counted for nothing. 
The school was simply a gymnastic exercise. 

Rousseau transferred the emphasis. Remove the 
trammels. Let nature have its course. Do not 
force traditions and old customs and ancient 
methods upon the child. Let its own nature unfold 
like a flower in the sun. Respect individuality. This 



298 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

was Rousseau's plea. It was one-sided, defective, 
inadequate. But it contained a profound insight. 

Rousseau was followed by Pestalozzi who simply 
gave form and added some positive elements to 
Rousseau's conception. The teacher can only assist 
the child to develop. Follow the free natural bent of 
the child. Ordinary schools are " stifling machines." 
Up to five years of age the child is free. Nature 
lies before him in entrancing beauty. His nature 
responds and unfolds. Then we clap him into a 
dungeon. Intellectually we murder him. Nay, nay, 
says Pestalozzi. Education is symbolized by a tree 
growing from a seed under the influence of rich 
soil and fertilizing waters. It is spontaneous, free, 
progressive, and after its kind. 

Pestalozzi, however, went only part of the way. 
He confined his view to impressions upon the senses 
from external nature. The moral element was lack- 
ing. Herbart introduced it. Use sense perceptions 
as the basis for moral training, urged Herbart. Let 
the mind of the child obtain impressions from nature 
and from society. Then on the basis of these im- 
pressions and this knowledge seek to develop moral 
character. A chief point of Herbart's psychology is 
apperception — building at each stage on the mate- 
rial preexisting in the mind. It is like the evan- 
gelist's work of putting the sinner " on the clew," 
as Doctor Mabie expressed it. 

The modern educational movement may in a true 
sense be said to culminate in Froebel. He gathers 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 299 

up the best elements in his predecessors and adds 
some of his own. Beyond others he recognizes the 
freedom and personality of the child. Particularly 
did he lay stress upon the fact that the mind of the 
child is creative and not merely receptive. Self- 
activity is its fundamental law. The mind is not 
a box into which you are to put all kinds of coins 
for safe-keeping. It is a living, growing thing. 
Education is not information, it is self-realization. 
Froebel held that the ultimate fact and bond of all 
unity is God. He says : " All things have come 
from Divine Unity, from God, and have their origin 
in the Divine Unity in God alone." The child then, 
in its education, should learn of God. This is the 
one great comprehensive fact of all life. Nature 
everywhere, as a symbol, reveals God, and through 
it the child should learn of God. 

Culmination of the Educational Process. 

Here then the educational process culminates in 
the axioms of religion. The right of the child to 
its individuality in education, to direct access to God, 
its equality of privilege in the schoolroom with all 
other children, its freedom and responsibility, its 
self-activity, these are FroebeFs fundamental princi- 
ples. Their exact counterpart in ecclesiastical and re- 
ligious life is what we have pleaded for in this work. 
It is not strange that Froebel himself was a deeply 
religious man. We see how, step by step, educa- 
tional theory and method have made their way back 



300 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

to the great universals of Christianity, the first 
principles of religion. Thus we see how one genera- 
tion has added to the work of another. Each great 
thinker has carried the truth a step beyond his prede- 
cessor. Like a succession of great sculptors chisel- 
ing a beautiful statue out of marble, each has laid 
down the mallet and chisel with the work un- 
finished. Now that the truth of educational theory 
and practice begins to be seen as a whole, we may 
discern how the crude beginnings of the Chinese 
even are gathered up in the result. We see also the 
greatness of Jesus, the King among teachers, and 
how our best thoughts and maturest theories as 
to the priceless value of the soul, the unique mean- 
ing of personality, individuality, and freedom, are 
but dim reflections of the truth as embodied in and 
taught by him. We also see how potent are the 
axioms of religion as an intellectual force in the 
progress of the world. 

There have been developments since Froebel, of 
course, but none that are radical or fundamental. 
The combination of the idea of discipline with that 
of interest is now being wrought out. It was clearly 
perceived that the figure of the flower unfolding in 
the sun was not sufficient of itself to express the 
process. Flowers do not become petulant and unruly. 
They do not disobey and play truant. Children, in 
short, have wills, and evil impulses lead them astray. 
Self-control and intellectual and moral mastery of 
self must be achieved by effort, by self-denial and dis- 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 3OI 

cipline. Thus the two ideas are being fused into one 
in the best recent educational method. Our sketch 
does not require that we include later movements. 
Nor has it required that we discuss the philosophic 
theories of the men whom we have been reviewing. 
We have sought simply to indicate the relation of 
the development to our general point of view. 

Relations to Science and Philosophy. 

We need add but few words upon the other two 
topics under our present head, the relation of the 
axioms of religion to science and philosophy. In 
a previous chapter intimations have been given. 
Moreover, the reader will perceive the truth on this 
point without difficulty. Science results from the 
direct and free approach of competent observers to 
the world about us. Philosophy is born of the free 
approach of human thought to the universe of ab- 
stract truth. The world of nature and the world of 
thought, these are the regions in which the men of 
science and the students of philosophy ply their call- 
ings. Both these forms of activity and the rights of 
both sets of observers are implicit in the right of 
all men to direct access to God. 

The axioms of religion assume the following: i. 
The correspondence and ultimate agreement between 
external truth and the powers of the human mind. 
2. That man is capable of grasping the truth as to 
his relations to the universe. 3. That the ultimate 
object of man's thought and devotion on the one 



302 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

hand and the human mind on the other, act and 
react upon each other in such a way that they will 
finally come to mutual adjustment. Time will be 
required of course. The Christian assumption that 
God is seeking man as well as man seeking God is of 
far-reaching import for philosophy. The compe- 
tency of the soul in religion under God is the 
guarantee of the competency of man as an investi- 
gator in God's universe. Science has not always 
been open-eyed to spiritual truth. Philosophy has 
sometimes groped in the darkness and floundered in 
the quagmire of materialism. But to-day men of 
science and of philosophy are gazing upward as 
never before. The light of the eternal is beginning 
to beam on them. Men have delved into nature, they 
have tunneled through the material world in the dark 
until they have suddenly broken through upon the 
vision of the pearly gates of the beautiful city of 
God. We are beginning to see that the city of 
nature which science is building is but the counter- 
part of the city of grace which revelation disclosed 
to John on the isle of Patmos. The city from below 
is rising to meet the city from above, the New 
Jerusalem which is coming down from God to this 
earth. The two cities will become one. The empire 
of truth has no mountain barriers, no oceans rolling 
impassably between the scattered parts. For we 
hasten to the time when there will be " no more 
sea." " And there shall be no night there, For the 
Lord God giveth them light." 



baptists and world progress 303 

The Axioms as a Social Force. 

3. We next glance briefly at the axioms as a social 
and political force in world-progress. We have 
shown that the axioms require democracy in the 
church. In a preceding chapter we have pointed 
out their relations to American civilization. In so 
doing we have rendered unnecessary an extended 
discussion of our present topic. A few general 
remarks will suffice. 

What then is the probable direction of the social 
and political progress of mankind? The negative 
side of the reply can be given easily. Surely the 
world will not return to autocracy, or monarchy, as 
the ideal of human government. The blood shed at 
Marston Moor and at Naseby, that which drenched 
the earth at Saratoga and Yorktown will cry out 
forever against it. Again, men will not return to 
aristocracy. They will not set up an oligarchy and 
give it plenary powers. Feudalism is dead. Theoc- 
racy again, in the sense of the Middle Ages, is out 
of the question. God's reign through an autocratic 
head of the church may remain for a time as a 
form of human government. But the stars in their 
courses fight against it. Every movement toward 
liberty and enlightenment opposes it. 

Democracy holds the future. Every barrier to the 
free expression of the will of the people, to the ulti- 
mate authority of the people in civil government 
must and will be broken down. The signs are mul- 



3O4 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

tiplying all about us that even in America we are 
not satisfied with our approximation to democratic 
government. The adoption of the initiative and ref- 
erendum by one State, and the growing interest in 
these expedients of governments, are one of the signs 
of the times. The tendency to the popular election 
of senators is another. This is already being ac- 
complished indirectly in many States without a 
specific law on the subject. We cite these things 
not to approve or condemn but only as marking 
tendencies. The rising tide of moral sentiment 
against the corrupt government of cities is a sig- 
nificant evidence of the direction in which our life 
is tending. A look at Russia, and India, and Japan, 
and at European countries, confirms the view that 
democracy holds the future. It may come slowly. 
It may not always find the same formal expression, 
but it will come. The world is becoming conscious 
of itself. The prodigal in the far country is com- 
ing to himself. He will arise and return to his home 
and his inheritance. The prisoner in bonds is be- 
ginning to discern that the chains of tyranny which 
bind him are rusting in two. He will arise in his 
might and cast them off. 

A New Force. 

A new force which is making itself powerfully 
felt in modern life is Socialism. Many assert that 
this form of propaganda holds the key to the future. 
What have the axioms of religion to say regarding 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 305 

Socialism? The reply is that the axioms are anti- 
socialistic but righteous. They stand for the volun- 
tary readjustment of economic conditions in right- 
eousness, not their compulsory adjustment. Socialism 
recognizes the terrible inequality of material condi- 
tions, the pitiless cruelty of the competitive system at 
many points. It says turn over the instruments of 
production to the State. Abolish competition. Pro- 
vide for each man according to his needs. Exact 
from each according to his strength. 

But individualism is a fact of human life and of 
Providence. Inequalities in human personality will 
always create inequalities of condition. The social- 
istic scheme ignores this fact of Providence. It 
seeks to cure a recognized evil by ignoring a fact 
which is organic in human nature, and which be- 
longs to the providential order. Socialism will 
modify the present social order at many points, but 
it cannot permanently reorganize society. God loves 
us too much to be content with anything but our 
best. Enforced equality is not the best achievement 
of man in government. Voluntary readjustment in 
equity and love is the best. Unregenerate majorities 
may thrust Socialism upon men for a time. It will 
not endure because it does not express finality in 
economics, morals, or religion. The socialistic prop- 
aganda borrows its glamour by contrast with pres- 
ent conditions which, in truth, are bad enough. But 
the best always comes slowly. Undue haste is often 
fatal in moral and spiritual movements, 
u 



306 the axioms of religion 

Socialism and Axioms of Religion. 

The axioms of religion leave room for all that is 
worth while in Socialism. But they also recognize 
individualism. The axioms of religion, on the 
economic side, conform to the parable of the Talents. 
They, with Christ, take into account that one man 
has five talents, another two, another one. Socialism 
asserts that no man shall have five. If nature en- 
dows him with five times the ability of his neighbor 
Socialism says he shall not have scope for its full 
exercise. Socialism not only protests against the 
overman of Nietzsche, the ruthless, pitiless giant 
spurning love and kindness as weak and effem- 
inate qualities; it likewise has no patience with 
the " big brother " of Christianity. Socialism is in 
straits to dispose of Christ himself. Sindbad the 
sailor was shipwrecked on an island where there 
was a giant as tall as a palm tree, having only 
one eye in the center of his forehead, with 
lips that hung down to his chest, mouth deeper 
than that of a horse, and ears like those of an 
elephant. This giant picked up the shipwrecked 
sailors one by one and turned them around and in- 
spected them, like partridges, and selected the fattest 
for supper. When his hunger returned he ate 
another sailor. Sindbad himself escaped only be- 
cause he was mostly skin and bones. 

The vision of such a monster haunts the imagina- 
tion of the socialist. But his fear, while not wholly 



BAPTISTS AND WORLD PROGRESS 307 

groundless, may be offset by other facts. We place 
over against this gruesome image the radiant figure 
of Jesus Christ, taller than all the sons of men, and 
bearing with and in himself all the resources of God 
to regenerate mankind. The type that is arising is 
the great man after Christ's image, great in thought, 
and in love; great to will, great to plan, great to 
execute. All the race is rising in stature with him. 
All will not, cannot be equal in mental, moral, or 
physical stature. But all have equal rights and 
privileges, all are equally responsible, all who obey 
God are hastening to the glorious image, and the 
glorious estate and the glorious liberty of the sons 
of God. 

Axioms and Progressive Civilization. 

We conclude this long chapter and end our task 
by declaring that the axioms of religion derived 
from the gospel of Jesus Christ are fitted to lead the 
progressive civilization of the race for the following 
reasons : First, because as religious ideals they sup- 
ply the profoundest basis for civilization. Secondly, 
as ideals preserved through the religious life of man 
in a Church which is separated from the State they 
can influence civilization from without and be ex- 
empt from the peril of becoming themselves in- 
volved in political movements and thus suffering 
corruption. Thirdly, because they embody the laws 
of man's intellectual progress. Fourthly, because 
they respect and conserve every fact of human 



308 THE AXIOMS OF RELIGION 

nature and the providential order of the world; 
man's freedom and personality; his capacity in art, 
morals, government, and religion; his passion for 
growth and progress, his hunger and thirst for 
God. In the fifth and last place, because they con- 
ceive the universe as a kingdom of free spirits 
wherein under the tutelage and guidance of God 
man is to work out his destiny. This is the guar- 
antee that that kingdom will in due time become 
a kingdom of perfect justice, of spotless righteous- 
ness, and enduring love. 




GENERAL INDEX 



Agnosticism, a belated philosophy, 
66. 

Allen, Prof. A. V. G., on Puritanism 
and Monasticism, 135. 

American Government, and a New 
Testament Church, 273. 

Anabaptists : their part in separation 
of Church and State, 48 ; reject 
practice of infant baptism, 107 ; 
faith in infants denied by, 109 ; 
stood alone for all Reformation 
signified, 258 ; grasped inner logic 
of Reformation, 259. 

Anglicans, their views on church 
polity, 139. 

Anglo-Saxons : their love of free- 
dom, 154 ; their principle of indi- 
vidualism, 57. 

Arnold, Matthew, quoted on "Na- 
ture and Man," 81. 

Augsburg Confession, The : its defi- 
nition of the church, 138; its sev- 
enth article, 287. 

Autonomy : inherent in believers' 
life, 40; Christ's gift of, 128; an 
evil of, 149. 

Axioms of Religion : statement of 
the six, 73 ; not an exhaustive 
creed, 74 ; laws of the kingdom 
of God embodied in, 77 ; their po- 
litical counterparts, 273 ; contain 
essential elements of modern civ- 
ilization, 279 ; their religious and 
moral force, 280; as a religious 
force, 394 ; as an intellectual force, 
295; their relation to science and 
philosophy, 301 ; as a social force, 



303; and progressive civilization, 
307. 

Axiom, The Ecclesiastical : ex- 
plained by religious axiom, 127. 

Axiom, The Moral : stated, 150 ; its 
appeal to our self-consciousness, 
150; infant baptism violates, 161. 

Axiom, The Religio-Civic : stated, 
185; states relations between 
Church and State, 185; difficulties 
arising under interpretation of, 
197 ; Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli 
repudiated modern, 259. 

Axiom, The Religious : stated, 92 ; 
asserts the principle of individual- 
ism, 93 ; vital to Christianity, 94 ; 
cannot be annulled, 98 ; violation 
of, 99 ; infant baptism and, xoo. 

Axiom, The Social, 201. 

Axiom, The Theological, 79. 

Baptism : as symbol of truth, 41 : 
not saving, 94 ; Roman Catholi- 
cism gradually corrupted, 101 ; and 
heathen rites, 102 ; modern exe- 
gesis favors believers', 115, 122 ; 
Congregational writer's statement 
regarding, 121 ; basis for, 166 ; a 
duty universally binding, 238 ; pre- 
cedes church-membership, 238 ; 
fixes the contents of faith, 242 ; 
sprinkling destroys meaning of, 
245 ; and the Lord's Supper, 249. 

Baptism, Infant : illustrating depar- 
ture from Christianity, 99 ; difficul- 
ties in Pedobaptist denominations 
concerning, 63 ; and the Reforma- 

309 



3io 



GENERAL INDEX 



tion, 107; Roman Catholic view 
of, 107; irreconcilable with justi- 
fication by faith, 108 ; Lutheran 
view of, 109; Calvin's view of, 
no ; Presbyterian view of, 114 ; 
Methodist teaching regarding, 119 ; 
Congregational views on, 121 ; 
papacy resulted from, 144 j cardi- 
nal evil of, 157; radical presuppo- 
sitions underlying practice of, 164 ; 
forestalls evangelism, 281., 
Baptists : and missionary and social 
problems, 21; historical signifi- 
cance of, 44, 56 ; in Rhode Island 
and Virginia, 44, 187 ; soul freedom 
always held by, 47, 187 ; their con- 
ception of Christianity, 50; dis- 
tinctive principles of, 50 ; historical 
and ecclesiastical significance of, 
56 ; political significance of, 57 ; 
often misunderstood, 71 : essential 
views held by, 72 ; their new de- 
fense, 73 ; their basis of faith, 74 ; 
set forth basis of agreement, 76 ; 
their plea, 76 ; origin of German, 
Russian, and Brazilian, 136 ; their 
assumption regarding regenerated 
church-membership, 145 ; and or- 
ganization, 147, 212 ; two great 
conceptions promulgated by, 187, 
260 ; and Christian union, 221 ; and 
" organic " union, 231, 294 ; their 
contribution to American civiliza- 
tion, 255 ; interpreters of the Ref- 
ormation, 258 ; position of, as to 
infants dying in infancy, 260 ; their 
spiritual interpretation of Christi- 
anity, 261 ; their formal articles on 
missions and work of the Holy 
Spirit, 260 ; and denominational 
unity, 263 ; their capacity for elim- 
ination, 265 ; and liberty, 266-268 ; 
furnish spiritual analogues of po- 
litical system, 270 ; their bed-rock 
ideals, 275. 



Baptist General Organization : vol- 
untary principle must control in, 
212 ; its results achieved by prin- 
ciple of federation, 226. 

Baptist Young People's Union of 
America, signalizes Baptist genius 
for integration, 264. 

Brace, Loring, testimony of, 144, 
284. 

Bryce, on relations between Church 
and State, 185, 186. 

Buckle, on relations between Church 
and State, 186. 

Bushnell, Dr. Horace: on "Chris- 
tian Nurture/' 168; and the Bap- 
tist position, 169; his position, 
1 71-173. 

Calvin : his view on infant baptism, 
no ; resorted to temporal environ- 
ment, 138 ; his community became 
a theocracy, 138. 

Carey, William, mentioned, 187. 

Child, the : his difficulties after in- 
fant baptism, 159 ; unconscious de- 
velopment of Christian character 
in, 168 ; should become consciously 
a Christian, 176 ; elements of Chris- 
tian life in, 178 ; conversion of, 
178 ; environment of, 181. 

Christ : God's message to man, 30 ; 
access to God through, 94 ; the 
lordship of, 128 ; his relations to 
the church, 130; his supreme au- 
thority, 142 ; and the will, 154 ; his 
secret of authority, 156; the true 
imitation of, 207 ; claimed by revo- 
lutionaries of all kinds, 209. 

Christianity : and social service, 16 ; 
tendency toward an anti-institu- 
tional, 19, 22 ; a relation between 
God and man, 28 ; elementary 
truths in Baptist conception of, 
50 ; Roman Catholicism and epis- 
copacy represent dualistic, 63 ; ax- 



GENERAL INDEX 



311 



ioms of, 73 ; religious axioms vital 
to, 94; infant baptism illustrating 
departure from, 99 ; forces which 
shared in corruption of early, 100 ; 
pagan rites led to sacerdotal, 101 ; 
infant baptism at variance with p 
119 ; guided by a new law, 145 ; 
freedom of, 154 ; regenerated indi<= 
vidualism necessary in, 204 ; its 
best service, 210 ; institutional and 
anti-institutional, 235; a church° 
less, 235; advocates of "open 
membership" rob, 253; Baptists* 
spiritual interpretation of, 261. 

Christian Nationalism, Canon Fre- 
mantle maintains theory of, 192. 

Christian Nurture: Dr. Horace 
Bushnell on, 168 ; principles of 
natural heredity introduced into, 
171 ; principles of, 173 ; distinction 
between old and new covenants 
in, 179; distinction between nat- 
ural and spiritual heredity in, 176 ; 
environment a condition of, 181 ; 
childhood, strategic point in, 183. 

Christians, classification of, 206. 

Christian Union : a question of ad- 
justment, 17, 221 ; axioms form 
basis for discussion of, 76 ; Bap- 
tists and, 221 ; in the deeper sense, 
222 ; proper basis of, 224 ; twofold 
method of, 228 ; and the voluntary 
principle, 293. 

Church, the : its relations to the 
kingdom of God, 36 ; its indiffer- 
ence to social conditions, 66 ; and 
equal privileges in, 127; twofold 
relationship of believer and, 128; 
a definition of, 129 ; legislation not 
needed in, 131 ; Baptist definition 
of, 132 ; pure democracy in New 
Testament, 131 ; men who repudi- 
ate, 235 ; theory of " open mem- 
bership" in, 236; New Testament 
teaching regarding organizing of, 



238 ; baptism precedes membership 
in, 238 ; not mechanically con- 
structed, 250 ; a plea in favor of 
"open membership" in, 244. 

Church and State : seed sown for 
separation of, 44 ; struggle for su- 
premacy between, 47 ; Virginia 
Baptists and, 49, 187 ; competency 
of the soul and doctrine of, 54 ; 
Baptists and separation of, 57 ; 
Hooker's view on, 138, 190; Ro- 
manism's position on, 139 ; Pres- 
byterians and Congregationalists 
believe in separation of, 140; ex- 
changed weapons, 145; religio- 
civic axiom states relations be- 
tween, 185 ; Baptists promulgate 
doctrine of, 188 ; the English and 
relations between, 190 ; Gladstone 
quoted on, 191 ; Macaulay quoted 
on, 191, 195 ; Canon Fremantle's 
view concerning, 192 ; and Eng- 
lish thinkers, 193 ; Roger Williams' 
theory of, 194 ; their functions dis- 
tinct, 195 ; modern life and, 233. 

Church-membership : necessity for 
a regenerated, 54 ; requirements 
for, 162 ; opinions regarding re- 
quirements for, 236 ; baptism pre- 
cedes, 238. 

Church, New Testament: pure de- 
mocracy of, 131 ; its origin, 133 ; 
not mechanically constructed, 250 ; 
and the American government, 273. 

Church of England, Lambeth Ar- 
ticles of, 221. 

Church Order : two general views 
regarding, 23 : not subject to or- 
dinary laws of expediency, 42. 

Church Organization : spiritual af- 
finity leads to, 35; from within, 
133 ; from without, 136 ; its prin- 
ciple reversed, 137 ; taught in New 
Testament, 238 ; and foreign mis- 
sions, 291 ; reinterpretation of, 292. 



312 



GENERAL INDEX 



Church Polity: and spiritual law, 
27 ; spiritual development of, 132 ; 
temporal development of, 137 ; va- 
rious modifications of, 137; An- 
glicans' and Puritans' views on, 
139; its best form, 210; plea for 
centralized, 216 ; congregational 
form of, the predestined goal, 228. 

Church State, Baptists oppose the, 
2x2. 

Civilization : new ethical questions 
on our, 206 ; and society, 255 ; fun- 
damental law of, 257 ; Baptists and 
spiritual interpretation of, 261 ; 
Baptists and idea of liberty in 
American, 266 ; religious axioms 
and advancing, 277, 280 ; Guizot's 
idea of, 277 ; its pivot, 279 ; and 
evangelism, 282 ; democracy in 
church a religious force in, 283 ; 
axioms and progressive, 307. 

Competency of the Soul in Religion : 
doctrine of, 53-58 ; Romanism de- 
nies, 59-63 ; its relation to Protes- 
tantism in general, 63-65 ; its re- 
lation to modern progress, 65 ; ax- 
ioms of religion outgrowth of, 73 ; 
platform of human rights, 77 ; Bap- 
tist views on, 212 ; political side 
of, 271 ; evangelism and, 280. 

Congregationalism : capable of great 
diversity, 148 ; direct antithesis of 
Romish hierarchy, 129. 

Congregationalists : and status of 
baptized infants, 64, 123 ; their 
" Half-way Covenant," 120 ; their 
attitude toward separation of 
Church and State, 140. 

Constitution of the United States, 
its first amendment, 49, 269. 

Creeds : useful or divisive, 143 ; Bap- 
tists have no binding, 146. 

Democracy in the church : corollary 
of doctrine of soul's competency 



in religion, 55 ; author of, quoted, 
121 ; of New Testament, 131, 134 ; 
accords with nature of kingdom of 
God, 134 ; successfully worked, 
145; its equipment, 146; modern 
life and, 253 ; analogous to repre- 
sentative government in the State, 
272 ; as a religious force in civili- 
zation, 283 ; Professor Harnack 
favors, 285 ; safeguards spiritual 
rights of the soul, 289. 

Denominationalism : new test of, 
12 ; new cohesive principle needed 
in, 19 ; examined in light of New 
Testament ideal, 27 ; and mis- 
sions, 291. 

Denominational Unity, and Baptists, 
263. 

De Tocqueville, quoted, 252, 257, 
271. 

Doctrinal Adjustment, proolem of, 

*3- 
Donatists, their offense, 134. 

Ecclesiastical Development : direc- 
tion of, before Reformation, 104 ; 
test of, 141. 

Edification, spiritual law of, 40. 

Education : Chinese, 296 ; Greek, 
296 ; Roman, 297 ; Rousseau's, 
Pestalozzi's, Herbart's, and Froe- 

j, bel's conceptions of, 298; culmi- 
nation of process of, 299. 

Election : God's method of, 85 ; and 
man's freedom, 86, 87. 

Episcopacy : and Roman Catholi- 
cism, 66 ; corruption of New Tes- 
tament teaching, zoo. 

Episcopalians : missionary and so- 
cial problems and, 21 ; two ways 
of entering church held by, 64. 

Erastianism, its powerful influence, 
190. 

Ethical Questions, New : illustrate 
progressive civilization, 206. 



GENERAL INDEX 



313 



Evangelism : and the soul's com- 
petency, 280 ; and modern civiliza- 
tion, 282; expresses principles of 
the axioms, 295. 

Faith : man's response and, 33 ; im- 
mediate result of act of, 33 ; char- 
acterizes members of kingdom of 
God, 34 ; first law of the kingdom, 
38 ; various degrees of, 242 ; kept 
pure by ordinances, 242. 

Family, The : organic unity of, 168, 
171 ; and church distinct, 174. 

Federation, The Principle of: Bap- 
tists achieve results in general or- 
ganization by, 225. 

Filial Service: spiritual law of, 39; 
axioms of religion interpret and 
explicate, 77. 

Freedom : against heredity and ma- 
terialism, 151 ; Jesus taught moral, 
152; self-determination of, 153; 
Anglo-Saxons' love of, 154 ; power 
conjoined with, 155 ; Professor Van 
Dyke on, 163 ; Roger Williams on 
religious, 268. 

Froebel, modern educational move- 
ment culminates in, 298. 

Germany, origin of Baptists in, 136. 

Gladstone, his view of Church and 
State, 48, 191. 

Gnosticism, shared in corruption of 
early Christianity, 100. 

God : Christianity a relation between 
man and, 28 ; Christianity empha- 
sizes Fatherhood of, 29 ; incarna- 
tion of, 58, 83 ; sovereignty of, 79, 
82 ; his method necessarily slow, 
84 ; his election of men to salva- 
tion, 85 ; key to sovereignty of, 89 ; 
law of Christian life and, 92, 94 ; 
his method of freeing the soul, 282. 

Gordon, Dr. A. J., quoted on New 

- Testament Church, 133. 



Gordon, Dr. G. A., his doctrine of 
divine sovereignty mentioned, 80. 

Gospel or Word : the first, 31 ; per- 
sonalized, 32. 

Guizot : on function of religion, 157 ; 
his idea of civilization, 277. 

Hall, Pres. C.C., on church organiza- 
tion and foreign missions, 290, 291. 

Harnack, Prof. Adolf : his definition 
of essence of Christianity, 235; 
his arraignment of Established 
Churches of Europe, 285. 

Heredity : natural does not imply 
spiritual, 166; natural and spir- 
itual, 176. 

Hierarchy, slowly evolved, 103. 

Hodge, Dr. A. A , quoted on infant 
baptism, 114, 115. 

Holiness : spiritual law of, 41 ; "Ax- 
ioms of Religion" interpret and 
explicate, 77. 

Holy Spirit, his agency in church 
organization, 133. 

Hooker, his view of Church and 
State, 138, 190. 

Human Body and The Church, The, 
130. 

Individualism in Religion : Anglo- 
Saxon principle of, 57; principle 
of, 93 ; an over-emphasis of, 148 ; 
social theology a counterpoise to, 
201 ; Harnack quoted on, 235 ; 
Abbe Loisy quoted on, 252 ; Saba- 
tier quoted on, 252. 

Interdependence and Brotherhood, 
spiritual law of, 40. 

Jesuits, their view on Church and 

State, 139. 
Judaism, shared in corruption of 

early Christianity, 100. 
Justification by faith : Baptists hold 

truth of, 51 ; doctrine of soul's 



3H 



GENERAL INDEX 



competency includes, 54 ; neces- 
sary to church-membership, 63 ; 
and infant baptism, 108. 

Keswick Movement, The, offers a 
haven for spiritually hungry, 290. 

Kingdom of God : divine personal- 
ity, love, revelation, redemption, 
distinguishing notes of, 29 ; initial 
stage in development of, 31 ; faith 
a characteristic of, 34 ; relations of 
church to, 36 ; spiritual laws of, 
38 ; basis of agreement formed by 
assumptions of gospel of, 76 ; char- 
acteristics of members of, 96 ; sum- 
mary of characteristics of, 97 ; 
church polity question of consti- 
tution of, 132 ; distinction between 
old and new covenants in, 180; 
and church not identical, 243 ; and 
the church, 250 ; authority cannot 
be localized in, 272. 

Lambeth Articles, The : a platform 
for Christian union, 221 ; serious 
objection to, 223. 

Legislation, not needed in the 
church, 131. 

Liberty : spiritual law of, 39 ; not in 
peril, 241 ; Baptists gave to civili- 
zation complete idea of, 266 ; Roger 
Williams and religious, 268. 

Loisy, Abbe, on individualistic 
Christianity, 252. 

" London Confession," promulgated 
separation of Church and State,i88„ 

Lord's Supper, The : as symbol of 
truth, 41 ; Roman Catholicism 
gradually corrupted ordinance of, 
101 ; and baptism symbolized vital 
elements in Christianity, 249 ; Bap- 
tists reject sacramental conception 
of, 261. 

Lutgert, Prof. Wilhelm, on infant 
baptism controversy, 109. 



Lutheran Church, its view on infant 
baptism, 109. 

Luther, Martin : ecclesiastical con- 
ditions at time of great movement 
by, 104 ; resorted to temporal en- 
vironment, 138. 

Macaulay, his position regarding 
Church and State, 191. 

Man's Freedom and Election, 86. 

Methodism, identified with Estab- 
lished Church, 140. 

Methodists : pressure of missionary 
and social problems felt by, 21 ; 
their teachings regarding infant 
baptism, 119. 

Missions and Denominationalism, 
291. 

Missions, Foreign, and the churches, 
Dr. C. C. Hall on, 290. 

Missions, World-wide, promulgated 
by Baptists, 187, 260. 

Monasticism : spiritual freedom of, 
134 ; perpetuated by Puritanism, 
135; emphasized worth of indi- 
vidual, 201. 

Monroe, Prof. Paul, on progress of 
the principles of education, 296. 

Nature and Man, 81. 

Newman, Cardinal, and Development 
of Christian Doctrine, 23, 42, 142. 

Nonconformists : battling for relig- 
ious equality, 48 ; their churches 
modern equivalents of monasti- 
cism, 135 ; their solution of Church 
and State problem, 190. 

Obedience : an all-inclusive Baptist 

principle, 51 ; important under 

soul's competency, 56. 
Oncken, his influence in German 

Baptist history, 136. 
Onderdonk, Bishop H. U., his theory 

on infant baptism, 113. 



GENERAL INDEX 



315 



Opportunism in Control, 139. 

Ordinances : as symbols of truth, 
41 ; transformed from symbols into 
sacraments, 101-103 ; a plea for 
excluding, 244-247 ; their proper 
place, 246 ; symbolize vital ele- 
ments in Christianity, 249. 

Papacy, resulted from infant bap- 
tism, 144. 

Pedobaptist Denominations, infant 
baptism a difficulty in, 64. 

Philosophy : emphasizes helplessness 
of man, 81 ; its relation to axioms 
of religion, 301. 

Presbyterians : pressure of problems 
felt by, 21 ; their two ways of sal- 
vation, 64 ; their doctrine of infant 
baptism, 114 ; their attitude toward 
separation of Church and State, 
140; seek to justify their system, 
272. 

Priesthood : an idea of paganism, 
101 ; interposed between the soul 
and God, 103 ; its terrible power 
of spiritual tyranny, 104 ; not in 
New Testament churches, 134. 

Problems of Adjustment : doctrinal 
adjustment one of, 13; social as- 
pect of, 16 ; foreign missionary as- 
pect of, 17 ; their pressure felt, 
21. 

Protestantism : competency of the 
soul in relation to, 63-65 ; infant 
baptism has no logical place in 
churches of, 124. 

Puritanism, perpetuates monasti- 
cism, 135. 

Puritans, their views on divine ori- 
gin of church polity, 139. 

Quakers, ignore ordinances, 248. 

Redemption : Christ the medium of, 
30 ; results from act of faith, 33. 



Reformation, The : justification by 
faith a principle of, 57 ; ecclesias- 
tical conditions existing at begin- 
ning of, 104, 105 ; principles of, 105, 
106 ; infant baptism most trouble- 
some question of, 107 ; polities 
arising after, 139; Baptists inter- 
preters of, 258. 

Regeneration : results from act of 
faith, 33 ; a basis of church or- 
ganization, 35, 52 ; implied in 
principle of soul's competency, 
54; contains seeds of all righteous- 
ness, 205. 

Renaissance, intellectual principle 

of, 57- 

Revelation, kingdom of God distin- 
guished by principle of, 29, 

Rhode Island, Baptists in, 44. 

Roman Catholicism : spirit of Chris- 
tianity quenched by, 37; its the- 
ories regarding the ordinances, 
41 ; its system at variance with 
New Testament ideals, 42, 43 ; de- 
nies right of believer to interpret 
Scriptures, 52 ; denies soul's com- 
petency in religion, 59 ; ordinances 
gradually corrupted by, 101 ; its 
position regarding Church and 
State, 139 ; a Church State, 210. 

Roman Imperialism, shared in cor- 
ruption of early Christianity, 100 

Romanists and the Soul's Compe- 
tency in Religion, 59. 

Rousseau, his conception of educa- 
tion, 297. 

Russia, origin of Baptists in, 136. 

Sabatier, on peril of individualism 

in religion, 252. 
Sacerdotalism : resultant corruption 

of New Testament teaching, 100 ; 

pagan rites led to, 101. 
Sacraments : as ordinances obscure 

faith, 41 ; multiplied, i&* 



316 



GENERAL INDEX 



Salvation : spiritual law of, 38 ; ax- 
ioms of religion interpret and ex- 
plicate, 77 ; expressing God's sov- 
ereignty, 83, 84 ; God's election of 
men to, 85 ; sole priesthood of 
Jesus as author of, 101 ; its greater 
conception, 205. 

Schaflf, Doctor, quotations from, 105, 
106. 

Science : and modern philosophy, 
81 ; and axioms of religion, 301. 

Scriptures : best interpreters of, 13 ; 
question of conformity to, 25 ; their 
authoritative and regulative value, 
30 ; Roman Catholics deny right to 
interpret, 52 ; become medium of 
truth, 68; the rule of faith and 
practice, 131 ; Holy Spirit inter- 
preter of, 131 ; as a guide of the 
church, 143 ; binding and funda- 
mental, 237. 

Sin : the unpardonable defined, 96 ; 
use of doctrine of original, 103. 

Smyth, Dr. Newman, quoted, 162. 

Socialism and axioms of religion, 
304-307. 

Social Service : and Christianity, 16 ; 
opportunity for, 203 ; best prepa- 
ration for, 209. 

Soul freedom always held by Bap- 
tists, 47, 188. 

Spiritual affinity leads to church or- 
ganization, 35. 

Spiritual Laws : of the kingdom, 38 ; 
axioms embodied in, 77. 

State Church : Roman Catholicism 

• a, 210 ; being more centralized and 
secularized, 286; Baptists oppose, 
2x2. 

Strategic Men in History, 87. 

Testament, New : variety in the in- 
terpretation of, 12; new test of 



denominationalism supplements 
teachings of, 12 ; two views of 
church order based on teachings 
of, 23 ; its teachings as to kingdom 
of God, 38; Roman Catholicism 
at variance with ideals of religion 
of, 45 ; competency of soul a prin- 
ciple of, 54 ; its principles of the 
soul's competency violated, 65; 
its teachings held by Baptists, 72 ; 
its great assumptions, 74 ; its teach- 
ings regarding the religious ax- 
iom, 94, 98 ; its teachings alien to 
infant baptism, 115, 122 ; its part 
in origin of Baptist churches in 
Germany, Russia, Brazil, etc., 136 ; 
its assumptions fundamental, 237 : 
its church not mechanically con- 
structed, 250; Baptists' only rule 
of faith and practice, 262 ; evan- 
gelism of, 280. 
Theology, A Social, a counterpoise 
to individualism, 201. 

Uixkull, Baron, origin of Russian 

Baptist movement told by, 136. 
Unitarians, abjure ordinances, 249. 

Van Dyke, Professor, quoted on 

freedom, 163. 
Virginia, Baptists in, 44 

Wilkinson, Dr. W. C , his work on 
the "Baptist Principle," 52. 

Williams, Roger : seed of doctrine of 
soul liberty planted by, 45, 268 ; his 
theory of Church and State, 194, 

Word, The, or Gospel : first, 31 ; 
personalized, 32 ; man's response 
to, 33. 

Worship : spiritual law of, 38 ; " Ax- 
ioms of Religion" interpret and 
explicate, 77. 



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